My Lords, I rise briefly to move Amendment 9, which could be described as a friendly amendment to Amendment 8; I hope its mover will agree. Proposed new paragraph (db) has already been supplanted by government Amendment 6, but I will speak to proposed new paragraph (da) on the food system, because the kind of shortages that the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, identified in areas such as engineering and technical skills are also very much reflected in our food system.
We recently heard the Prime Minister say that it is not the job of government to feed people and that it is up to business, but I hope the Minister will acknowledge that it is crucial in this age of shocks—where, as we see from our empty shelves, we cannot be guaranteed that the market will feed us—for the Government to see that we have the skills available right through our food system. The obvious area for this is farming, but we must also think about training people, in schools and communities, how to cook; that is why I used the term “food system”, which is something the Dimbleby report identified. We have many faults in our current food system which need to be fixed, and lack of skills is certainly one.
It is now obvious that the market on its own will not guarantee food security; it has also not guaranteed a healthy supply of food, and we need to think not just about the supply of calories but about a healthy food supply and healthy food preparation. Of course, we have the problem that, in our current food system, one in six workers is not paid enough money to be food-secure themselves. Upskilling the food system and providing those skills in local plans is absolutely crucial. I beg to move.
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