Part of 1. 1. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Environment and Rural Affairs – in the Senedd at 1:45 pm on 8 March 2017.
Diolch, Lywydd. Brexit is probably going to have a greater impact on agriculture than almost any other sector, obviously because it’s regulated under the common agricultural policy and funded largely through the European Union. The Government, therefore, has to be thinking ahead very deeply about what’s going to be our agricultural regime after we’ve left the European Union.
I’ve been reading the minutes of the European advisory group, which the First Minister established six months ago, to see what their thinking is, and I was surprised to discover that agriculture hasn’t featured at all, as yet, in their considerations. That may be related to the fact that there’s only one member who has any recognisable agricultural credentials amongst those who have been appointed to it. So, I wonder whether this indicates that the Welsh Government isn’t, perhaps, terribly interested in the future of agriculture in our country.