Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-02-13-Speech-2-299"
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"en.20070213.20.2-299"2
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"Madam President, once again, given the importance of this dossier to the UK farmers and our rural communities, I cannot vote in favour of the rapporteur’s recommendations to reject this voluntary modulation dossier.
I also take the opportunity to remind all British MEPs from all political parties that support for rejection will have serious consequences for the UK’s rural development spending plans and, in effect, you will be voting for a massive cut of over EUR 1.2 billion in British rural areas over the next 6 years.
I also remind all Members of the House that, due to the low allocation of rural development money received by the UK compared to other Member States, the voluntary modulation system is not only needed but also essential in delivering ambitious and effective rural development programmes in my country.
I think we need to spend a little time assessing what all this means, just as a way of highlighting the importance of the issues.
Firstly, voluntary modulation will allow the UK to deliver a much broader range of environmental outcomes in line with stated EU policies.
Secondly, whilst appreciating the political sensitivities surrounding Parliament’s right, we must surely focus on the potential of securing real and genuine development gains for rural areas. For example, we can give payments to farmers under agri-environment schemes designed to deliver environmental and biodiversity benefit; we can support hill farmers and farmers in the uplands; we can work on schemes to help mitigate the effect of climate change through support for energy crops and other renewable energy products and we can help protect our countryside in key natural resources.
All of this is put at risk by Parliament’s attitude towards voluntary modulation and that is why Labour Party MEPs will vote against the committee’s short-sighted recommendation. Without voluntary modulation, the UK will only be able to honour existing contracts, falling far short of what we would like to do.
Finally, I would like to ..."@en1
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