My Lords, I should note, for the record and for the whole of Report, my interest as a Devon farmer. For many years, we have been adding organic matter to our porous red sandstone soils to increase sequestration, combat run-off, build resilience to drought, decrease the need for chemical fertilisers and provide Teignbridge District Council with somewhere to put all the garden waste.
In Committee, we debated a number of potentially priority areas in Clause 1(3). I am glad that this one in particular has returned, and I will strongly support it. I would have added my name to it if it had not been so eminently oversubscribed. I am less keen on Amendment 3, the light-pollution amendment, which pales in comparison and importance to this one.
The prior debate on these amendments only explained how important this is. In Committee, the Minister confirmed that our understanding of soils is
“not as complete as it should be.”—[Official Report, 21/6/21; col. 95.]
He begged for more time to gather the necessary data. There is simply no more time to do so: our soils are in a crisis and have only a few harvests left, as we have heard from a number of noble Lords. If it is not a priority, how will we ever gather that data? How will Defra be instructed to gather it? The absence of data is seriously damaging the debate on environmental matters, and it is encouraging a number of extremes.
Take the debate on grass-fed meat and dairy. It is a topic close to the hearts of all Devon farmers. We all agree on the negative impact of indoor lot-fed meat and dairy consuming grain and soya in terrible welfare conditions, but no one knows the net environmental impact of beef and sheep fed on the ancient green pastures of the West Country because the data and the science are not there and everybody has an argument. This was confirmed to me just last week in discussions with an eminent environmental scientist at Exeter University. We really need that data, and this amendment needs to be made to encourage Defra to collect it.
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Finally, if we do not have all the data, this does not preclude soil being a priority area. Clause 1(2) requires only that the Government
“set a long-term target in respect of at least one matter within each priority area.”
Surely Defra can come up with a single priority or measure with respect to soil that it will be happy with. As we heard from the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of York, we live in the earth; that is, the soil. As the noble Lord, Lord Deben, and the Climate Change Committee have said, this amendment should be made.