Part of 1. 1. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Environment and Rural Affairs – in the Senedd at 2:05 pm on 20 September 2017.
I wouldn’t say that farmers aren’t that concerned where powers lie. I think certainly the farmers who I’ve engaged with and the farming unions absolutely recognise that the agricultural powers belong to the people of Wales and they don’t want to see any power grab by the UK Government. You’re quite right—. I think probably—well, it was before the election that was called in June of this year, we were given assurance to 2020 and then following the election, the Treasury gave assurance to fully fund direct payments until 2022. Of course, that’s welcome, but we need far more detail around that.
So, I’ve always been very clear that we will have a Welsh agricultural policy post Brexit. However, we do accept that, in some areas, there will be UK frameworks. I’m very keen to start those conversations about the UK frameworks. Unfortunately, because we haven’t had any engagement with the UK Government for such a long time at a ministerial level, we’ve not been able to process those conversations. But certainly, on Monday, I will be raising UK frameworks in that quadrilateral meeting.