Proposals for a new Agriculture Bill – Consultation Response to Scottish Government

As a result of Brexit, the UK is no longer tightly bound to the EU Common Agriculture Policy (CAP). Farm policy is devolved, so the Scottish Government is developing a new approach. In the meantime, the existing CAP support measures remain in place, providing the basis for the huge annual payments examined in other posts¹. These currently stand at around £750m per annum, including direct and indirect payments to farmers and crofters. The Scottish Government has embarked on extensive consultations with the sector, involving a number of ‘farmer-led groups’ overseen by an ‘ Agriculture Reform Implementation Oversight Board’². The resulting proposals require new legislation, hence this large (and rather unwieldy) consultation with more than 70 separate questions to consultees. I didn’t attempt to answer all of them, since some topics are getting beyond my core interest in rural land management, but illustrate the massive complexity of the underlying issues. Overall, I thought the consultation tackled the right issues, but the proposals seem disappointingly similar to the previous Basic Payments System. In my view, this hands over far too much of the available support with far too little in terms of public benefit. The responses I submitted are as follows:

[Extracts from consultation paper text in italics for clarity]

The proposals for the new Agriculture Bill aim to provide an adaptive framework to respond to future social, economic, and environmental changes, challenges and opportunities.

This approach also enables tailored provisions and support to be implemented through secondary legislation and potentially adapted on a regular basis as required. This will enable specific targeted support to be adaptable to the future challenges and uncertainties, including climate impacts and market changes, whilst reinforcing our commitment to continue to support the agricultural industry.

The new Agriculture Bill aims to enable flexibility whilst ensuring that Scotland’s people are able to live and work sustainably on our land and this framework will deliver key outcomes:

high quality food production
climate mitigation and adaptation
nature restoration
wider rural development

For each of these proposals for the new Agriculture Bill, there are a number of questions to determine whether respondents agree with the aim of the proposal; agree with the suggested method to achieve that aim; have any alternative proposals for achieving the aim; and have any comments on the potential impacts of the proposals.

This consultation is split into 6 parts to reflect the proposals that the Scottish Government is considering for possible inclusion in the new Agriculture Bill. Each of these proposals will assist in the delivery of the Vision. These parts are:

Future Payment Framework – Proposals

The Future Support Framework proposes mechanisms should be incorporated into the new Agriculture Bill to enable conditional payments under 4 tiers:

Tier 1 – a ‘Base Level Direct Payment’
Tier 2 – an ‘Enhanced Level Direct Payment’
Tier 3 – an ‘Elective Payment’
Tier 4 – ‘Complementary Support’

Tier 1 and 2 would sit under the one umbrella of direct payments, acknowledging the need to ensure that conditions are fitted to the variance of Scottish agriculture, and Tiers 3 and 4 would be indirect payments.

Q1. Do you agree with the proposal set out above, in relation to the Agriculture Bill including a mechanism to enable payments to be made under a 4 tiered approach? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Don’t Know – Pillar 1 and 2 payments to farmers and crofters, currently exceeding £500m per annum across Scotland, outstrip all other forms of direct support for rural land management put together, while also making up a substantial proportion of net farm income (around 40% of net value added – Economic Report on Scottish Agriculture). Many farm businesses, even some whole sectors (notably livestock farming in the hills and uplands), would simply not be viable without these annual payments. So the way these funds are deployed is of huge consequence. While they provide appreciated socioeconomic support, it can also be argued that funding on this scale has been a key driver enabling rural land management’s contribution to the damaging practices creating our climate and biodiversity emergency.

Scottish Government endorsed the Leaders Pledge for Nature, a “commitment to urgent and transformational actions to address biodiversity loss”. The influence of rural land management and the scale of these payments makes them a foundation for practical action to meet this commitment.

Although the debate leading up to these proposals has hinted at this among key elements defining a wider public interest and justification in providing agricultural support, it seems extraordinary that these emerging proposals are so similar to the basic payments system currently in place.

It does not seem likely that these proposals are bold enough to drive the transformation of rural land management required to achieve the key Outcomes, at least unless any tiered payments are conditional on delivery of sufficiently high standards to achieve ‘transformation’. For example, in the current system, around £140m of annual direct ‘greening’ payments apparently achieve no identifiable benefit. Such tokenism does not set a good precedent and would not seem to be a good use of public money.

How will the new approach do better? Some assurance on this is urgently required. The Vision is right to assert that “it is necessary to ensure Scottish farmers and crofters have security of income and have the mechanisms in place to enable their activities to be rewarded” and “to ensure these mechanisms are flexible to emerging social, economic and environmental priorities”. The latter, especially, requires a transparent and responsive ongoing process engaging a range of stakeholders which has not yet been spelled out. Farmer-led groups are a small step in the right direction, but too narrow to meet these wider aspirations.

Q2. Do you agree that Tier 1 should be a ‘Base Level Direct Payment’ to support farmers and crofters engaged in food production and land management? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Don’t Know – Any support to farmers and crofters from limited public funds must be conditional on land management achieving defined standards of husbandry and stewardship supporting all four key Outcomes – public funds for public goods. All businesses in receipt of public support should be required to meet such standards. However, the numerous valid components of such conditionality (as listed in the proposal above) show the risk of creating a bureaucratic nightmare of paperwork which would fail to achieve the desired outcomes.

The focus here should be on how these multiple factors and stakeholders can be reconciled in a proportionate way, rather than this focus on the resulting ‘base level’ payment tier which implies an unjustified degree of entitlement over conditionality.

Q3. Do you agree that Tier 2 should be an ‘Enhanced Level Direct Payment’ to deliver outcomes relating to efficiencies, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and nature restoration and enhancement? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – I agree there must be scope for enhanced direct payments linked to commitments to deliver efficiencies, reduce greenhouse emissions and restore losses of biodiversity. More explanation is required to clarify how such payments are justified above and beyond the land management standards forming conditions for any tier 1 direct payments.

Q4. Do you agree that Tier 3 should be an Elective Payment to focus on targeted measures for nature restoration, innovation support and supply chain support? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – I agree there should be scope for further payments linked to commitments to even higher ambition. More explanation is required to clarify how such payments are justified over and above the standards required for tier 1 and tier 2 payments.

Q5. Do you agree that Tier 4 should be complementary support as the proposal outlines above? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know)

If so what sort of Complementary Support do you think would be best to deliver the Vision? (Please give reasons)

Yes – As budgets for staffing of public bodies have been cut back over the years, there has been a regrettable focus on ‘enforcement’ of a rule-based approach to the detriment of encouragement of good husbandry and stewardship. Enhanced and secure funding for a farm advisory service would help to counter this trend, but realistically there also needs to be a greater emphasis on fostering self help through enhanced support for local group actions.

Q6. Do you agree that a ‘Whole Farm Plan’ should be used as eligibility criteria for the ‘Base Level Direct Payment’ in addition to Cross Compliance Regulations and Greening measures? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – A ‘whole farm plan’ may be the best term to describe the package of conditionality defining eligibility, however there’s a key challenge to devise an approach which is proportionate while delivering tangible outcomes.

Q7. Do you agree that the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to help ensure a Just Transition? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – In principle this seems right, although it isn’t clear what form such a mechanism might take. It is essential to avoid slogans or token gestures which raise expectations without clearly defining practical support for land managers to whom this is applied. Many of the elements making up a Just Transition are touched on elsewhere in these proposals (ie rural support measures that foster a farm sector that more directly and explicitly supports our climate and environmental ambitions, in a way that is fair and leaves no one behind). Perhaps a mechanism to help ensure a Just Transition is simply the complete implementation of all these proposals.

Q8. Do you agree that the new Agriculture Bill should include mechanisms to enable the payment framework to be adaptable and flexible over time depending on emerging best practice, improvements in technology and scientific evidence on climate impacts? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – While there are merits in such flexibility included in the proposed Bill, it is essential that this is not simply open-ended, because then it becomes impossible to assess progress against the key outcomes. Any such flexibility must be defined in terms of an open and transparent process to be followed, engaging stakeholders and providing a clear evidence base for change.

Q9. Do you agree that the new Agriculture Bill should include mechanisms to enable payments to support the agricultural industry when there are exceptional or unforeseen conditions or a major crises affecting agricultural production or distribution? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – In principle this must be right, but the use of such mechanisms must be clearly circumscribed to make sure they are used only in exceptional circumstances and for a short time. Longer term difficulties should be addressed through the flexibility measures proposed in the previous question.

Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation – Proposals

To deliver the Vision and “emission reductions in line with our climate targets” we propose:

The new Agriculture Bill should include powers and other mechanisms to allow future payments to farmers, crofters and land managers to support delivery of national climate change mitigation objectives (including the statutory economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets and duties set in the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009).

The new Agriculture Bill should include powers and other mechanisms to allow future payments to farmers, crofters and land managers to support delivery of national climate change adaptation objectives (e.g. building resilience to relevant risks identified in statutory Climate Change Risk Assessments).

The new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable payments to be made that are conditional on outcomes that deliver climate mitigation and/or adaptation measures, along with targeted elective payments.

The new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable payments to be made that support integrated land management, such as for peatland and woodland outcomes on agricultural holdings, in recognition of the environmental, economic and social benefits that it can bring.

Q10. Do you agree with the proposal set out above, in relation to the new Agriculture Bill including measures to allow future payments to support climate change mitigation objectives? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know)

Do you have any views on specific powers and/or mechanisms that could support such alignment? (Please give reasons)

Yes – It is essential that the new Agriculture Bill has the scope to embrace the many factors bearing on rural land managers, as summarised in the four key Outcomes. Payments to support climate change mitigation must be part of this, without which the target to secure a one third reduction in carbon emissions over the next decade cannot be achieved. But greater clarity is required on how this reduction will be achieved, so that limited resources can be focused for maximum benefits. Which sectors, what land management changes, are most affected? Only then can funding mechanisms be best designed and implemented.

Q11. Do you agree with the proposal set out above, in relation to the new Agriculture Bill including measures to allow future payments to support climate change adaptation objectives? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know)

Do you have any views on specific powers and/or mechanisms that could support such alignment? (Please give reasons)

Yes – For adaptation as for mitigation, it is essential that the new Agriculture Bill has the scope to embrace the many factors bearing on rural land managers, as summarised in the four key Outcomes. Payments to support climate change adaptation must be part of this, so as to secure better resilience. But greater clarity is required identifying the priorities for better resilience in rural land management, so that limited resources can be focused for maximum benefits. Which sectors, what land management changes, are most affected? Only then can funding mechanisms be best designed and implemented. Building, for example, on the Farming for a Better Climate initiative is one worthwhile way to bring this about, yet activity on this appears to have tailed off during 2022. Has funding support been curtailed, or redirected to a new priority?

Q12. Do you agree with the proposal set out above, in relation to the new Agriculture Bill including a mechanism to enable payments to be made that are conditional on outcomes that support climate mitigation and adaptation measures, along with targeted elective payments? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – It’s important to be sure that all payments are aligned with all four key Outcomes, avoiding competing and contradictory results.

Q13. Do you agree with the proposal set out above, in relation to the new Agriculture Bill including measures that support integrated land management, such as peatland and woodland outcomes on farms and crofts, in recognition of the environmental, economic and social benefits that it can bring? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – Alignment of these multiple objectives is essential to achieve balanced progress across all four key Outcomes.

Delivery of Key Outcomes – Nature Protection and Restoration – Proposals

To deliver the Vision and “contribute to the restoration of nature through biodiversity gain” we propose:

We propose the new Agriculture Bill should include powers and mechanisms to protect and restore biodiversity, support clean and healthy air, water and soils, contribute to flood risk management locally and downstream and create thriving, resilient nature.

The new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable payments that are conditional on outcomes that deliver nature restoration, maintenance and enhancement, along with targeted elective payments.

That the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable and support action on a catchment or landscape scale.

Q14. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to protect and restore biodiversity, support clean and healthy air, water and soils, contribute to reducing flood risk locally and downstream and create thriving, resilient nature? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – A mechanism along these lines is essential because rural land management has such a key role in tackling and resolving our combined climate and nature emergency. The provisions of the Agriculture Bill must provide practical support for delivery of Scotland’s Biodiversity Strategy. A sectoral approach would be impractical and risk waste of limited resources where it resulted in competing measures. Farmers and crofters deserve a joined-up approach which provides clear signals and support for their efforts, so working to achieve our collective wellbeing.

Q15. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable payments that are conditional on outcomes that support nature maintenance and restoration, along with targeted elective payments? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – It’s really important that payments addressing different priorities across the four key Outcomes are aligned to avoid wasted resources through competition or failure to recognise connections. All payments must support delivery of all four key Outcomes.

Q16. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable landscape/catchment scale payments to support nature maintenance and restoration? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – It’s important that payments are not thought of only in context of an individual farming or crofting business. The combined effect of payments across landscape and catchments can reinforce joined-up delivery of key Outcomes and sometimes judicious wider resource commitments can help foster understanding of landscape or catchment land management opportunities.

Delivery of Key Outcomes – High Quality Food Production – Proposals

To deliver the Vision of “high quality, nutritious food locally and sustainably produced is key to our wellbeing – in economic, environmental, social and health terms. We will support and work with farmers and crofters to meet more of our own food needs sustainably and to farm and croft with nature.” We propose:

Giving powers to make changes to rules related to food – Further rules on common market organisation (e.g. marketing standards and trade descriptions) are contained in Scottish Statutory Instruments and retained EU law. The CMO ( was partially replaced and amended by the Agriculture (Retained EU Law and Data) (Scotland) Act 2020 (“the 2020 Act”). Now that the UK has left the European Union there has been the opportunity to see how powers need to be used in practice. As a result of this, some technical fixes are necessary to allow Scottish Ministers to readily amend retained EU law and related legislation on common market organisation in the area of food and drink.

Continuing to provide current support re. food – Furthermore, adjustments may be necessary to the nature of the support to enable the Scottish Government to deliver wider objectives while reflecting current circumstances. For example, there may be opportunities to tailor support to the Scottish context while maintaining the objective of EU alignment, in order to produce more of our own fruit, vegetables, and horticulture products; assist the apiculture programme; support the circular economy; or meet our climate change and biodiversity targets. Similarly there may be changes to support schemes at an EU level which Scotland wishes to consider as part of its policy of alignment. Therefore we propose that Scottish Ministers should have powers to amend the CMO regulations and to take appropriate measures to provide support to relevant sectors in the future.

Giving new powers to support the agri-food sector – The Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable payments which help deliver food production and, where appropriate, to provide grants to support both the agri-food sector and to bodies related to the agri-food sector in connection with:

Agri-food sustainability
Agri-food efficiency
Agri-food co-operation
Agri-food industry development
Agri-food education
Agri-food processing
Agri-food marketing

Giving reserve powers to support the agri-food sector – The new Agriculture Bill should include a power to declare when there are exceptional or unforeseen conditions adversely affecting food production or distribution, and the ability to provide financial assistance, if necessary, to the agri-food sector and related bodies whose incomes are being, or are likely to be, adversely affected by the exceptional or unforeseen conditions described in the declaration.

Q17. Do you agree that the powers in the Agriculture and Retained EU Law and Data (Scotland) Act 2020 should be extended to ensure Scottish Ministers have flexibility to better respond to current, post exit, circumstances in common market organisation and easily make changes to rules on food? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Q18. Do you agree that Scottish Ministers should have powers to begin, conclude, or modify schemes or other support relevant to the agricultural markets? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Q19. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to enable payments that support high quality food production? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – The amount and purpose of any such payments must be transparent, enabling clarity of understanding of the benefits of using public funds for public good.

Q20. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include a mechanism to provide grants to support industry in the agri-food supply chain to encourage sustainability, efficiency, co-operation, industry development, education, processing and marketing in the agri-food sector? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – The amount and purpose of any such payments must be transparent, enabling clarity of understanding of the benefits of using public funds for public good.

Q21. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include powers for Scottish Ministers to declare when there are exceptional or unforeseen conditions affecting food production or distribution? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – Agree, however safeguards are required to ensure that the exercise of these powers is evidence-based and that this evidence is open to scrutiny. Ministers lines of accountability to Parliament must be explicit, indicating the basis on which such powers are required and for how long. Any such powers must be time-limited showing how and when ‘normal’ conditions are expected to be restored.

Q22. Do you believe the new Agriculture Bill should include powers for Scottish Ministers to provide financial assistance to the agri-food sector and related bodies whose incomes are being, or are likely to be, adversely affected by the exceptional or unforeseen conditions described in the declaration referred to above? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – Agree, however the amount and purpose of any such payments must be transparent, enabling clarity of understanding of the benefits of using public funds for public good, are evidence-based and that this evidence is open to scrutiny. Ministers lines of accountability to Parliament must be explicit, indicating the basis on which such payments are required and for how long. Any such payments must be time-limited showing how and when ‘normal’ conditions are expected to be restored.

Q23. Do you agree that the new Agriculture Bill should include the powers to process and share information with the agri-food sector and supply chains to enable them to improve business efficiency? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Delivery of Key Outcomes – Wider Rural Development – Proposals

To deliver the Vision and “ensure that Scotland’s people are able to live and work sustainably on our land” we propose to undertake a whole land approach which seeks to optimise the use of our wider natural assets in striving to meet our climate change targets while benefiting and empowering rural communities as a whole we propose:

To make provision under the new Agriculture Bill to continue to provide the support to land-managers and communities who are undertaking and supporting economic activity related to land management including but not limited to agriculture.

To enable Scotland to continue providing support for rural development – collaborative, partnership working; capacity building; support for innovation and engagement in local and policy development – we propose the new Agriculture Bill should provide Scottish Minster’s powers and other mechanisms to allow:

Activity in and financial support for rural development and the rural economy generally.
Activity related to the delivery of community led-local development to enable delivery of the principles identified above.
Activity in and financial support for collaboration and the sharing of information, ideas and good practice.
Activity in and financial support for innovation in agriculture, food production, forestry, and land management.
Activity in and financial support for farmers, land managers, rural and island communities and stakeholders to influence policy developments.
Activity in and financial support for public access and the understanding of land use.

Q24. Do you agree that the proposals outlined above should be included in the new Agriculture Bill? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – It’s important to avoid any loss of continuity with previous experience of support for rural development, maintaining active engagement of a wide range of stakeholders, while also giving scope to nurture new initiatives emerging in response to changing circumstances.

Q25. Are there other areas relating to non-agricultural land management such as forestry that you would like considered for support under the Agriculture Bill to help deliver integrated land management and the products produced from it? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – Strong support is required to bring about a ‘whole land’ approach to rural land management, avoiding artificial or bureaucratic boundaries between different sectors and groups of stakeholders. Support for farmers and crofters is the largest programme, with implications for other sectors; careful alignment of expenditure across sectors (especially with forestry, biodiversity, access and recreation) will help to avoid contradictory and competing measures.

Q26. What other powers may be required to enable rural development in Scotland’s rural and island communities? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)

Yes – It isn’t clear how the work of the many public bodies involved fosters the best possible framework of support for Scotland’s rural and island communities. Too often, different public bodies pursue distinct priorities defined for Scotland as a whole without taking account of the combined effect of the resulting programmes for each locality. Statutory duties, eg to ‘have regard’ to each others responsibilities, are worthless without visible, ongoing collaboration and joint working. So a more explicit commitment or duty to this end would be valuable.

Q27. What potential social, economic or other impacts, either positive or negative, would such powers have on Scotland’s rural and island communities? (Please give reasons)

Rural Scotland, including the islands, face many universal challenges, for example health, housing, poverty and social inequality, which are also prominent in our main population centres. But in addition, rural Scotland is the site for additional challenges resulting from the climate and nature emergency which bear especially heavily on rural and island communities. This is mainly because there is more land (and sea) and fewer people. The scale of support for rural land managers, especially farmers and crofters, is hugely significant hence careful alignment of policy measures, effective collaboration between public bodies and the many stakeholders, both local and national is essential to make the most of limited resources. The positive impact of success will be progress towards the Government’s vision to “create a wellbeing economy: a society that is thriving across economic, social and environmental dimensions, and that delivers prosperity for all Scotland’s people and places”.

Animal Health and Welfare

Q28-30 not answered

Plant Genetic Resources and Plant Health

Q31-32 not answered

Skills, Knowledge Transfer and Innovation

Q33 – 36 not answered

Administration, Control, and Transparency of Payment Framework Data – Proposals

To deliver against the Vision and ensure that funding to support farming, crofting and land management is distributed based on sound financial management, budget principles, transparency and non- discrimination we propose that:

The Scottish Ministers take the powers to set an annual and/or multi-annual budget to support the proposed future support framework (outlined above) and enable intervention for the purposes of supporting high quality food production, climate change mitigation and adaptation, and nature restoration.

The Scottish Ministers take the power to set up an Integrated Administration and control System (IACS) which includes the following elements:

an identification system for agricultural parcels
a geo-spatial application system and, where applicable, an animal-based application system
an area monitoring system
a system for the identification of beneficiaries
a control and penalty system including recovery of payments where proportionate
a system for the identification and registration of payment entitlements
a system for the identification and registration of animals

This proposal will improve the effectiveness and monitoring of support payments and allow Scottish Ministers to create further IACS for the purposes of improving support effectiveness.

The Scottish Ministers take the power to collect information for the purposes of carrying out management, control, audit and monitoring and evaluation obligations and for statistical purposes, and shall not process that data in a way that is incompatible with those purposes. To allow for the measurement and reporting of key performance indicators which will help better inform future policy.

The Scottish Ministers take the power to gain independent assurance that objectives are being met. This is to ensure that the support provided is within the scope of agreed conditions.

The Scottish Ministers take the power to enable the publication of details pertaining to recipients who receive payments including under the future payment model (outlined above) and set a level above which payment details will be published.

Technical fixes to the Agriculture (Retained EU Law and Data) (Scotland) Act 2020 are necessary to extend the powers affected by section 5 to allow Scottish Ministers to amend retained EU law for CAP (Common Agricultural Policy) legacy schemes as needed to ensure their continued effective operation and regulation until they expire and also to ensure Scottish Ministers have flexibility to better respond to current, post EU exit, circumstances .

Q37. Do you agree that Scottish Ministers should have the power to create a system that provides for an integrated database, to collect information in relation to applications, declarations and commitments made by beneficiaries of rural support? (Yes/ No/ Don’t Know – please give reasons)