My Lords, I rise briefly to support Amendments 174 and 285 in the name of my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering. As other noble Lords have said, Amendment 174 changes the wording in Clause 18 to remove “severe” twice and replace it with “acute or chronic”. Having checked the definition of acute—
“sharp and severe in effect”—
I think this is a better word than just severe. Chronic is even better, defined as
“persisting for a long time and constantly recurring”.
Adding at the end
“caused by economic or environmental factors”
defines more broadly the parameters when financial assistance may be given at times of crisis caused, as other noble Lords have said, by unpredictable natural phenomena such as the flooding earlier this year and drought more recently, and animal diseases. Amendment 285 extends this wording to Wales.
Amendment 175 partially covers ground covered in Amendment 174, but I prefer the broader aspect ofusb the former. I like the definition in my noble friend’s amendment of when exceptional market conditions exist.