Common Agricultural Policy

I am very happy to address that. Indeed, I addressed it yesterday in the Scottish Parliament. I am not sure about red line issues. As the hon. Gentleman knows, there is no requirement for unanimity, so we can have a red line issue that stays a red line issue and not get our way. On key negotiations, I can assure him and the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan that we have made it absolutely clear that we think the Commission's proposals for the shift to an area basis is too draconian. The 40% first-year drop is far too dramatic, and we will support the proposition that there should be a more gradual transition. I shall move on to the greening issue. As other hon. Members have said, that is perhaps the most important subject—it has certainly grabbed the most headlines in the farming press and in debates. As the hon. Member for Ogmore said, to put it mildly, the greening situation requires a lot of improvement. There are three components. First, farmers with permanent pasture must keep it as such and must not be allowed to plough it. There has been grave concern—and, indeed, anecdotal stories—that some farmers have started ploughing such land because they do not want to be stuck with that obligation. I urge them not to do that because we can negotiate around it. Indeed, at the NFU annual general meeting three weeks ago, the commissioner said that he did not see a problem with farmers who wanted to reseed such land every 10 years. As long as we can get that commitment in writing, we have largely resolved the issue. So there is no justification for farmers to consider ploughing up permanent pasture. The second issue that has been debated is the requirement for a three crop rotation. My hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice) properly identified one of the nonsensical issues with that. A further issue with a three crop rotation is that very large numbers of dairy farmers, particularly those with outdoor stock farms in the hills, will grow a field of turnips, maize or barley to feed their own stock. It is clearly nonsensical for them to have a three crop rotation. We have made that point to the Commission repeatedly. I hope that we can get somewhere, but we will have to wait and see. I assure hon. Members that we have pressed very hard on that subject. The third part of the greening proposal is, of course, the 7% ecological focus area. The commissioner has said repeatedly in Council meetings that he is not trying to reintroduce set-aside. However, one has only to listen to the language of this debate to realise that that is how the matter is perceived. The commissioner has said that someone will be able to count their hedges, ditches and I think that I even heard him say tracks—in other words, what someone has not got in production—and take out some land to get to the 7% if they have not got enough out already, as will be the case with most farmers. If farmers are fortunate enough to have perhaps a piece of woodland, they may well already be up to their 7%. The Government consider that taking land out of agriculture, when, as hon. Members have all said, we need to increase production, is clearly wrong. However, there is a more fundamental problem with ecological focus areas. I have used the phrase that this is about trying to reach down to the lowest common denominator—the thing that most farmers will be able to meet without having to do anything—and that if they really have to, they might have to take a little bit more land out of farming. The British Government take the view that we need to be far more active. Several hon. Members have rightly referred to our stewardship schemes. Such active management is far more important. There is plenty of science to demonstrate that, in terms of environmental care, biodiversity, water retention or whatever, active management of a small area of ground can deliver far better results overall than simply watching—for want of a better word—the 7%. I will come back to the comments made by the hon. Member for Brent North in a moment before he leaves because I want to talk about his remarks on engagement. We are working very closely with a number of other member states to develop a proposal of what we might call equivalence measures: a menu of different options that member states can choose from, all of which have an environmental equivalence in quality terms. The commissioner has already made some good noises about appreciating the concept of equivalence, but he still seems to equate it with quantity rather than quality. That still concerns us.