My Lords, I wish to speak in support of Amendments 35 and 58, in the name of my noble friend Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, particularly because I am concerned about the lack of standards protections. We have been assured that the Government have repeatedly stated their commitment to high standards and that this Bill does not change that commitment, but, as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, has just said, it does not alter the fact that there is no evidence of that commitment on the face of the Bill.
Amendment 35 would expand the legitimate aims laid out in Clause 8 to include protection of consumers, environmental standards, social and labour standards, public health and animal health. I do not intend to rerun the various concerns raised regarding devolution, but we need to ensure that environmental protections in the UK are maintained and enhanced after our exit from the EU. Provisions in this Bill must not derail the Government’s ambition to become the first generation to leave the environment in a better state than they found it. I would like to give some examples of why that is so very important.
Since the Second World War, we have lost 97% of our meadows, 80% of our chalk grassland and more than half of our ancient woodland. The recent State of Nature report from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds found that 41% of UK species that it studied had declined since 1970. It found that 15% were threatened with extinction and 133 species were already extinct. The Natural Capital Committee has concluded that only half of our habitats currently meet minimum quality targets, with bees, butterflies, birds and many plant species continuing to decline. The BMA has called for a commitment to non-regression on all current UK-wide and devolved nation health, well-being, animal welfare and environmental standards to be written into the Bill.
The EU has been a leader in environmental legislation over the last 40 years, and the UK has played a very important part. Now, our domestic legislation must ensure that environmental protections in the UK are maintained and enhanced after our exit from the EU, and we must not risk losing any of those key protections or allow for any regression. Amendment 35 would help to ensure that those minimum standards were met.
I turn to animal welfare and food standards. UK farmers and producers are rightly proud of their high agriculture and animal welfare standards compared with those in many other parts of the world. They have been very clear that they do not want those standards lowered and are calling on the Government not to allow low-quality products to come into the UK.
It is also worth remembering that, when we reach the end of the transition period, the UK will find itself outside the European Food Safety Authority and therefore
outside the Panel on Animal Health and Welfare. Farm animal welfare standards post Brexit may well be threatened as UK farmers struggle to compete against cheap imported food from countries that produce to lower standards. UK farmers could become uncompetitive, and welfare standards could then come under pressure.
When I was in the other place working on the Agriculture Bill, I read your Lordships’ committee report Brexit: Agriculture and I am still hugely concerned about one of its conclusions. It said:
“It may be hard to reconcile the Government’s wish for the UK to become a global leader in free trade with its desire to maintain high quality standards for agri-food products within the UK”.
The legislation that is being passed in the run-up to the end of the Brexit transition period, including this Bill, will have huge impacts on the UK’s standards of animal health and welfare, food safety and environmental protection. Those ramifications could be felt for years, so we have to get it right. Farmers have told me that they are particularly concerned about transparency of provenance and traceability.
The United States is often mentioned in the debate about food standards, with chlorinated washed chicken and the use of injected growth hormones in cattle demonstrating the difference in standards between our countries. Both give rise to significant welfare concerns for the animals involved; both are banned by the EU and, until this point, have been banned by the UK. But we also know that a priority for the UK Government is securing a free trade agreement with the USA. This is also about food safety: the United States has 10 times more food poisonings than Europe, so food safety could be compromised. We could also end up with higher pesticide residues in food, if protections are negotiated away in trade deals.
Compassion in World Farming has pointed out that we should be concerned not just about the USA. It has looked at a potential deal with Australia, where hormone-treated beef and battery eggs are still common, and believes that, if concessions are made there, they could form a precedent for other talks and trade deals.
So we need to redefine unsafe food in the Bill, which is where Amendment 58 comes into play. That is why I am supporting it, recognising the impact that lower food standards can have on our safety and health. I ask the Minister to listen carefully to these arguments.