We need to re-set the debate on farming
Speech in the Senedd on 16th July 2025
Let me start with the obvious:
Farming is hard.
I am proud to come from a family of farmers, and I understand the vital role that farmers play.
We need them, and we value them as key workers.
Not only do they feed us, but they are an important part of our cultural mosaic, and at their best are stewards of our environment.
I think it's important to re-state this because the debate around farming is in a bad place. It has become dragged into the culture wars.
And those divisions are heightened through our political debate.
I’ve heard my colleagues make the point that farming contributes less than 1 per cent to the GDP of the country.
But that’s a bit like saying a washer contributes less than 1 per cent to the functioning of a tap.
It may be true, but it misses the point.
On the other hand, it feels like the main farming unions are fixated on a grievance narrative - and the opposition parties in this Senedd compete with each other to amplify it. They’ve become the political wing of the farming unions.
Yesterday the Welsh Government confirmed £238 million of public money to support farming.
The NFU described it as ‘a blow’. The Tories said it “lacks democratic legitimacy.”
They scan for every opportunity to say farmers are being ‘betrayed’.
They’ve called changes to inheritance tax a ‘betrayal’
Rules to reduce river pollution ‘punitive’ and ‘draconian’
And I’ve lost count of the number of ‘bitter blows’ they've described.
This is not a healthy debate.
Llywydd I’ve stopped attending union meetings on farms. The farming unions are the only groups I’ve come across who think effective engagement involves inviting a local representative to meet a group of men to be shouted at.
To be fair, the tactics did vary a bit. Sometimes I was shouted at in a cold mucky yard, sometimes I was shouted at in the warm over tea and lovely welshcakes.
But it is not a serious proposition to argue - as several farmers have to me - that they should get more public money, be subject to fewer environmental safeguards, and the Government should restrict imports to reduce competition.
This is unserious.
But if you get past the gatekeepers, almost all farmers recognise that their sector - like every other sector - has to change.
Once we made the decision to leave the EU change was inevitable.
The Common Agricultural Policy - which was a handy bogeyman for years - gave farmers a minimum income guarantee.
That is gone.
Before we left the EU, funding for the Basic Payment Scheme would come into the Welsh Government budget from Brussels and would immediately be passed on to farmers.
It wasn’t scrutinised.
It was not part of the annual debate of how to prioritise funding.
It was protected.
Leaving the EU meant that money no longer comes in.
The same is true for the grants we used to have for deprived urban areas. They have stopped too.
Wales now receives less money. A billion pounds less.
That’s what Brexit has meant.
I’m not sure how people who voted for Wales to get less money now argue we should spend even more on farming support.
This is unserious.
Farming now needs to make its case within the Welsh budget alongside health and education.
We can’t just hand over a basic payment. We have to be able to show additional public goods alongside food production.
And despite losing £1 Billion of EU funding we are still going to spend £238 million a year supporting farmers.
That’s a big number. It recognises the value we place on what they do. And is a big win for the farming lobby.
Now we have Sustainable framing Scheme we need to re-set the debate.
I want to see more of the excellent food we produce in Wales consumed in Wales.
Wales is one of the poorest and sickest parts of Europe.
And yet we will be setting aside £238 million of public money a year to subsidise food that is mostly sent to other countries.
Our farmers are not producing not quality food for our own school children or hospital patients. No, we serve them cheap imported food.
We don’t ask our farmers to grow fruit and vegetables, we import them too.
Nor do we use the upland to grow timber as a profitable crop to help us build homes. No we import 80% of our wood.
What we do instead is use precious Welsh public funds to pay our farmers to rear mostly cows and sheep - that have significant environmental impact here in Wales - to subside food in other countries.
And are our farmers benefiting?
Over 20% of Welsh farms are losing money.
The overall average farm makes just over £30,000 a year.
This system is not working for many people.
And yet whenever we try and reform that system the farming unions, and the opposition parties here, accuse us of betrayal.
This conversation needs a re-set. And it needs to start here.
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