Speeches by Dewhirst.

“Does the Secretary of State agree that the introduction of a pay-per-mile charge for motorists in next week’s Budget would disproportionately impact rural constituencies such as mine, because people are more reliant on cars to get about, and represent yet another slap in the face from this Government for the countrysid…”

“In the light of this recent escalation, what specific and immediate steps is the Minister taking to ensure that UK armed forces are equipped both to protect critical underwater infrastructure and to respond rapidly and effectively to direct threats from Russia and others?”

“Even then, I suspect you cannot just build the defences overnight, so you are going to lose—if it takes two years, it will be another 10 metres.”

“Does anyone else want to come in on this wider point of long-term funding? If not, I will hand back to the Chair.”

“11. What recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on the development of large-scale solar farms.”

“Given that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has yet to publish its land use framework or its 25-year farming road map, would it be prudent for the Government to pause all major solar farm applications until such time as they have a joined-up strategy for energy production on agricultural land?”

“When we saw that new analysis done of future erosion, it was quite extreme on the east coast. Is that taking into account what we are already doing? Are you more optimistic that it will not be as severe around the towns as we saw on the mapping?”

“Perhaps I can widen it out to local authority level. Do you feel that you are resourced adequately, or as best as you can be? Obviously, we would all like more money to do more, but can you give us a picture of how you see the next five or 10 years?”

“Thank you, Chair. I will try to keep this brief. I will come to Richard first as the obvious avenue for this question. We accept we cannot defend every inch of the coastline, and in East Riding that is particularly obvious where, as you have alluded to, they have coastal defences around Bridlington, Hornsea and Withern…”

“Perhaps I can widen it out to local authority level. Do you feel that you are resourced adequately, or as best as you can be? Obviously, we would all like more money to do more, but can you give us a picture of how you see the next five or 10 years?”

“Even then, I suspect you cannot just build the defences overnight, so you are going to lose—if it takes two years, it will be another 10 metres.”

“Thank you, Chair. I will try to keep this brief. I will come to Richard first as the obvious avenue for this question. We accept we cannot defend every inch of the coastline, and in East Riding that is particularly obvious where, as you have alluded to, they have coastal defences around Bridlington, Hornsea and Withern…”

“Does anyone else want to come in on this wider point of long-term funding? If not, I will hand back to the Chair.”

“When we saw that new analysis done of future erosion, it was quite extreme on the east coast. Is that taking into account what we are already doing? Are you more optimistic that it will not be as severe around the towns as we saw on the mapping?”

“Ultimately, the people impacted here are often those medium and small family farms. They are not necessarily looking for private investment in that sense. They just want to be able to make a living and grow fantastic British food.”

“Specifically looking at the landscape around DEFRA’s wider governance responsibility and accountability, you have the core Department and 34 agencies. Sometimes things seem to move at quite a glacial pace. What assessment have you made in this early period as Secretary of State of that landscape and do you have any pla…”

“I will not need to persuade the Fisheries Minister on the importance of shellfish to Bridlington, given that is where she is from. But can I make sure that when this fund is designed and implemented all sectors within the fishing industry will be able to access it equally so that it is not just offshore and that inshor…”

“Secretary of State, just very quickly on precision breeding while we are discussing it—and leaving aside the practicalities of future negotiations with the EU and so on—are you generally inclined to support the progression of precision breeding from plants into livestock, and the potential benefits we might have with e…”

“I will draw my questioning to a close in the interests of time.”

“Thank you. I feel we are not going to necessarily agree on this today and we will come back to it when Baroness Batters’s report is out on profitability on farm.”