UK farm czar urges govt to push through reform
Date: 29-Apr-02
Country: UK
Author: Mike Peacock
Earlier this year, Curry said British farming, ravaged by mad cow disease and last year's foot-and-mouth epidemic, needed radical overhaul, moving away from intensive operation and heavy subsidies to environmentally sustainable schemes and organic farming.
Curry, who chaired the Commission on Food and Farming, said that after last week's annual budget - which had little to say about farming - he was prepared to wait for Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown's summer spending review but no longer.
He also warned the government to enact his plan in full, not "cherry pick" the easier parts.
"To be fair we didn't expect major statements in the Budget. We have to wait for the spending review," Curry told BBC radio.
"We will then have an indication as to whether the funds will be made available...to begin this process of shifting support from direct food subsidies to sustainable environmental schemes which we hope will help our industry going forward in a much more constructive and positive way."
In a package costing 500 million pounds over the next three years, Curry has called for sweeping reform of the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy to divert production subsidies to countryside protection and rural development schemes.
Brown's budget last week raised taxes and pumped a tide of funding into the creaking health service. Education and crime fighting were also favoured but farming got barely a mention. His summer Comprehensive Spending Review will spell out exactly which government departments get what from his budget pot.
Curry dismissed further consultation - a favourite government tactic across a range of difficult policies - as a waste of time and said his report must be implemented in full.
"A cherry-picking approach to this report will not work. If we only adopt the easy bits...we will not move forward, we will not achieve the change that is necessary," he said.
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary Margaret Beckett said she too was looking to Brown's summer allocation.
"(Curry) wasn't expecting things in the budget...none of us were," she said. "It's in the spending review that those discussions will come." But Liberal Democrat agriculture spokesman Colin Breed said Brown may disappoint. "Margaret Beckett seems incapable of securing the funds necessary to make change possible," he said. "She must bring pressure to bear on Gordon Brown."