Speeches by Reed.

“The points you make are very important. If anyone was not aware that food security is national security, what happened in Ukraine, in the Red sea and during the pandemic would have shown them that it is. The answer is not to close the borders and try to produce everything we want to eat in this country, but we need an …”

“We have the food security reports that will be published in December. That will give you a hell of a lot of metrics around what food security looks like.”

“Well, there is a whole load of data in there and that is what we will be looking at. At the core, food security is about a secure and resilient supply of good-quality, accessible, affordable food. But there are so many metrics that will come into that, you will need to give me time to—”

“You will need to give me time to pick out the ones that I think are the most important. Imports will play a part in food security. I do not think we can seek to become, and we never have been—”

“People should, and will, make their own choices about what they want to eat. It is not for the Government to tell people to eat this, or do not eat that. In my experience, what people want is good-quality information to help them make the best possible choice. I forget the name of the report, but in about February of t…”

“I am very interested in what we can do to provide more information to consumers to make their own choices. I am not interested at all in the Government telling people what they can eat.”

“Specifically on trade deals, I was very pleased that we had a line in the manifesto that ruled out trade deals that undercut farmers on things such as welfare and environmental standards, in the way that the Australia and New Zealand trade deal did. That was catastrophic for farmers and there will be no more of any of …”

“I am worried that the Chair will ask me for a short answer to that huge question.”

“I will try to keep it as concise as I can. The commission that Sir Jon Cunliffe is leading is part of a wider strategy. We took the first steps towards that seven days after the general election. I had the chief executives of the water companies in my office, and we agreed an initial package of voluntary reforms. Those…”

“The third stage of these initial reforms was to invite Sir Jon Cunliffe to lead a commission that will look at the water sector in its entirety. That is looking at governance, regulation, how the water sector is structured and how we can move to catchment-based approaches to water management, so that we can see all of …”

“I will come to a couple of your other points. When will it report? It is intended to report in June next year. The Committee may wish to make its own submissions to Sir Jon on the work that he is doing. In terms of ownership, we are looking at how we reform a privately owned, regulated water sector. We are not looking …”

“Personally, no, because it goes through the water companies. But I have had meetings with the Financial Secretary to the Treasury—Spencer, as I know him—with the investors at roundtables to understand their concerns about investability into the sector. At the growth summit at the Guildhall, we again met investors to un…”

“Yes, the two things go hand in hand because we need that investment coming in, in April. Out of interest, even at £88 billion—and it may change—that is the single biggest investment in the water sector in the history of this country and the second biggest private sector investment in any part of the economy for the ent…”

“That is a huge question. I will not repeat what we will do on sewage, because the amount of investment that we are hoping will come in from April is how we start to fix that, alongside the work that Sir Jon will be leading on the reforms of governance and regulation. On agricultural run-off, I referred earlier to the f…”

“It links back to that investment coming in. Frankly, water infrastructure in this country is in an appalling state, and that is why we have record levels of sewage. It is also why you have the problems in Cornwall, where last year, you had both the hosepipe ban and flooding at the same time, because the infrastructure …”

“I will take the vet deal, yes.”

“There are some measures in the Water (Special Measures) Bill—which is going through the House of Lords now and should be in the Commons very soon—that will strengthen enforcements by claiming back the costs of enforcement action from a successful prosecution against a water company, so that it generates more resources …”

“It is still bedding in, isn’t it? It is an intelligence-led model, it is risk-based, and it is contingent on the deal with the European Union that is not yet fully operating in the way that it should be. We have a watching brief on that; that is probably the best—”

“What do you think, Emily?”

“But it is one we are very aware of as well, particularly African swine flu and illegally imported meats from certain countries in Eastern Europe, in particular. There are real concerns about that, so that is something we are keeping a watching brief on as well. We will see how that situation develops.”