UK Parliament / Open data

UK Dairy Sector

Proceeding contribution from Daniel Kawczynski (Conservative) in the House of Commons on Wednesday, 20 April 2016. It occurred during Debate on UK Dairy Sector.

I must correct the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie): the best dairy products are from Shropshire. I congratulate the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams) on securing this debate.

When I was first elected as a Member of Parliament in 2005—11 years ago—we set up the all-party group on dairy farmers because at that time Shropshire farmers were on their knees. We heard a lot of anecdotal evidence about the terrible financial difficulties they were suffering. Eleven years on and we are in almost the same place as then—indeed, we are probably even worse off. It is rather frustrating to have repeated debates in Westminster Hall while the situation continues to worsen, so I am really looking forward to the Minister giving us some heart-warming news of specific Government action on this issue.

I am delighted that tomorrow I will be attending the Shropshire business awards 2016 at RAF Cosford to support my friend, Daniel Morris, a cattle farmer, in the farming section. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will wish my constituent every success.

When we set up the all-party group on dairy farmers, more than 200 MPs joined—it was one of the largest all-party groups in the House of Commons. We produced a report, and during the process interviewed a lot of people, even going to Brussels to take evidence. We came up with two recommendations: first, a grocery adjudicator, and secondly, a limited cull of badgers. We took those recommendations to the then Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, David Miliband, who basically laughed us out of his office saying that both were completely impossible and would never happen. I am extremely pleased that the Government have introduced the Groceries Code Adjudicator but, as has been said already, we want to hear what teeth the adjudicator is going to be given and about the roll-out of limited badger culls.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
608 c385WH 
Session
2015-16
Chamber / Committee
Westminster Hall
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