Reading Chronicle | Opinion | Richard Benyon's Westminster Diary

Saturday, 17th May, 2008

Published: Thursday, 8th May, 2008 09:00

Richard Benyon's Westminster Diary

By Richard Benyon, MP for Newbury

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Newbury MP Richard Benyon

I ATTENDED a briefing on food security last week.

Recent years have seen us becoming ever more dependant on imported food. We have grown used to having access to any sort of food regardless of the season because of cheap imports all year round from every part of the globe. In recent weeks food prices have shot up.

This is for a number of reasons but particularly because of the price of oil. It is also right to ask if we should be reliant on food from poor countries, grown at the expense of staple foods needed by the indigenous populations in those countries.

Future governments will need to look at ways to encourage our own farmers and growers to produce more of what we need. This is a giant task but cannot be in any country’s long term interests to become dependant on our basic needs from abroad. The Common Agricultural Policy is now derided by politicians on all sides but it is worth reminding ourselves that it was created to give Europe plentiful food and a cheap price to the consumer.

This noble intention fell foul of the centralising nature of European government. Food may have been cheap in the shops but it was more than made up for in taxes.

“Plentiful” became “excess”, with wine lakes and butter mountains. We must learn that we can’t create a food policy that runs from the snowy north of Finland to the arid south of Spain. It is time to get local. Food that is produced locally tends to be of better quality and better for you.

Animals reared for meat in Britain are subject to much higher welfare standards than those from abroad. It is just possible that the price of oil will achieve the effect of making better quality local food cheaper than the food we have become used to. That might just be what they call a virtuous circle.

So Boris has done it. A huge achievement when you consider that London is a left-of-centre City. If you average out elections in London over the last 20 years it always returns more Labour and Liberal MPs than Conservatives.

I hope he sets about clearing out some of the flotsam that fills the bloated bureaucracy created by his predecessor. He has the brains and drive to be a really successful Mayor.

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