My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response and all noble Lords who have taken part in this important and useful debate. There are just two or three things that need to be picked up. The noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, started off with some sympathy for what we were saying but then turned against it, citing the continuation of the existing schemes. As the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, pointed out in his intervention, however, the world is changing—rapidly—and it may well be that, in the coming years, new schemes may be introduced and therefore that assurance would not have validity. Indeed, there is a general concern that marginal farms could be bought up by big institutions and squeezed out of existence.
I take the Minister’s point about the Agriculture Act, but we just wanted to make sure that we could add into the Bill the very good principles in the Act. I accept that it applies to England, but it would be very surprising if the Government of Scotland took issue with the principles in it. The point, nevertheless, is that farmers want an assurance that the support that they have had under various schemes since the Second World War is likely to continue in some form or other. There is a very real worry that that is not the direction of travel in which the Government are heading. That the matter is devolved does not preclude it also costing a significant amount of money, which previously came from the European Union’s common agricultural policy and now has to fall on the budget of the devolved Administrations.
I hope the Minister will understand, therefore, that the reason we are trying to put this in the Bill is to set out an explicit assurance that marginality will be a criterion that will be encouraged, just as a minor detail. Moreover, if that is in the Bill, it will make it more difficult for New Zealand or Australia, for example, to suggest that the subsidy is somehow incompatible with a trade agreement. Speaking with the experience of an MP for a farming constituency, I can assure the House that the suckler cow premium and the hill farmers have been the basis of building up the pre-eminence of Scotch beef and Aberdeen Angus beef. It is a system that has worked extremely well. Take the subsidies away from the hill farmers and prime Scotch beef will be much harder to deliver economically. The same applies to lamb in Wales and in Scotland. The hills of Scotland, Wales, the Borders and the Lake District without lambs and sheep would not be the attraction that they have been in the past.
I regret to say that I do not think that the Minister’s assurances go far enough, and I would like to test the opinion of the House.