Speeches by Zeichner.

“It is.”

“Whenever you have a situation where there is a strong level of power, there is always the possibility that that is hard for others who are price takers, essentially.”

“I think you will find there have been a lot of debates in this place.”

“You raise a very interesting issue, and I know your interest; indeed, I remember talking about this when in opposition. I am very happy to talk about the land use framework; in fact, I shall be meeting stakeholders later this afternoon to discuss it. The same principles apply in many ways, but the marine spatial priori…”

“The assessment the Treasury did is detailed in a letter that the Chancellor published to the Treasure Select Committee. I have not seen any evidence to suggest that those figures have changed since then.”

“We want to look closely to make sure it provides good value for money. Obviously, decisions that devolved Governments make are their decisions, we do not always take the same decisions.”

“As the Minister responsible, I am absolutely determined that we defend the UK fishing industry.”

“To some extent, you are right. But that is why I go back to the starting point on this. We have moved from a scheme where 80,000 farm enterprises were all entitled through the basic payment scheme to get resource, to a different approach. This was the consequence of the Agriculture Act and the move to that system. Theo…”

“I totally sympathise and understand the situation people found themselves in, but when you look at the complexity of these different schemes and the inter-relationship between them, we need to design a better system so that people can understand how it works and what the risks are. We need to decide how we allocate mos…”

“Well, two things. As I say, it is actually directly a DBT responsibility, but my understanding is that there is a current review under way, the fourth statutory review, which began on 20 March 2025. I am told that Ministers in the DBT are still finalising the exact arrangements for the review, but it is in line with th…”

“I have not had any communication so far.”

“As I say, Chair, I believe we have robust supply chains, and I encourage people to have a reasoned dialogue, very much as we have had this morning, about the way forward for the future. The overwhelming message should be that this is a really important sector all the way through the food chain. It does a magnificent jo…”

“Thank you for inviting us this morning. I am Daniel Zeichner. I am the Minister for Food Security and Rural Affairs.”

“I think it is working effectively, yes.”

“It does not tell the whole story, because we are working, as I say, within the legislative framework that was agreed by Parliament under the Fisheries Act. Our task is to make those judgments.”

“It absolutely does, but it shows the complexity of the decisions that are being made. As a Minister, I can only follow the scientific advice we are being given.”

“May I look to you for that one, Mike?”

“That is the purpose of having a review: that you look at it.”

“I cannot comment on individual cases, but I can say that, almost inevitably, some schemes will provide better environmental outcomes than others. We have inherited a package of schemes that do some very good things. I should say at this point that when you look at the number of farms that are now in schemes, it is quit…”

“Of course it is not, because it was not done in the way that we would have liked to have done it.”