Thank you for calling me to speak, Mr Deputy Speaker, on a subject—the British dairy industry—hugely important to my constituency and, I contend, to our nation. I want to speak in particular about the crisis currently engulfing it.
I have always appreciated the importance of dairying. My first job, for the first 10 years after I joined the family business, was milking cows. I do not suppose I am unique among Members in that regard, although I might be the only existing MP who has actually milked cows by hand. I often stayed with my grandparents when I was young; they had eight cows which they milked by hand, and they produced butter that was circulated in the village. Therefore, I feel a considerable attachment to the industry—and we really did use three-legged stools, for those who are wondering.
Dairy farming has shaped and maintained the countryside of Britain as we know it for a century. It is an industry we should value and support. Today, dairy farming is in deep trouble—an important primary production industry torn apart by the corporate greed and ruthlessness of processors and retailers. Dairy farming is being reduced to an unsustainable position. Dairy farmers will be forced out of business and inevitably, more dairy products will be imported unless there is change. We should do our utmost to prevent this from happening.
It is not possible to calculate precisely the cost of milk production because circumstances vary, but it is generally accepted to be 29p to 31p per litre. Some of our major retailers acknowledge this. Waitrose and Marks and Spencer contract with farmers and allow for the production costs to be covered. Sainsbury’s and Tesco, too, contract with farmers for some of their milk, and they too allow the costs to be covered. However, others do not and they should be named and publicly shamed: Asda, Morrisons, and Co-op are huge businesses that show a shocking disregard for their suppliers. The processors—the in-between businesses that buy from farmers and sell to the retailers—should also be named and shamed: Arla, Robert Wiseman and Dairy Crest are happy to watch suppliers go out of business, in order that they can maintain their large profits.
The dairy products marketplace, as we know, is deregulated and unbalanced. The contracts under which milk is traded are incredibly one-sided. Buyers have discretion to impose price cuts almost without warning, while sellers are tied to long-term notice periods.