The new farm team at the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs received more praise yesterday from what was once one of the department’s sternest critics, the Tenant Farmers’ Association.

The TFA’s top team had been invited to a “get-to-know you” meeting with Caroline Spelman, the new Defra Secretary, and afterwards TFA chairman Greg Bliss issued a statement which read:

“It was a really useful meeting and it was good to engage with a ministerial team who had a clear understanding of the issues that we were talking about. We were very quickly into the detail and did not have to spend too long explaining the background”.

This was a barbed dig at former Labour ministers, who were regularly accused of having little understanding or interest in farming, being more interested in subjects like climate change despite the fact that there are growing worldwide food shortages.

New Labour switched farm subsidies from production to environmental schemes but often these grants were paid to the owners of the land, not the tenants who actually work it, meaning that hill farmers in areas like the Yorkshire Dales were hit by falling incomes at a time when it was already difficult to make a living.

This was one of the major subjects under discussion yesterday. Other topics covered included tenancy succession, diversification, CAP reform, regulation, rural housing, county council smallholdings and food security.

Said Greg Bliss: ““We wanted to highlight the need for the Government to ensure that it considered the special circumstances of tenant farmers when it was developing policy. Too often those who develop Government policy for agriculture unconsciously assume that all farmers are owner-occupiers and are able to make their own decisions about how to respond to Government schemes and initiatives.”

The point was illustrated during the meeting with the way in which DEFRA and Natural England have implemented Environmental Stewardship Schemes such as the new Uplands Entry Level Scheme which fails to define adequately whether it is the landlord or the tenant which has the ‘management control’ set out in EU legislation. This has resulted in many tenant farmers being locked out of these schemes.

“Both the Secretary of State and Minister of State understood our concerns fully and agreed that the national implementation of this EU rule should be looked at again. This is particularly pertinent and urgent in the case of many upland farmers who have lost the payment of the Hill Farm Allowance and are unable to access the new Uplands Entry Level Scheme.”