Debate contribution: Nutrients Action Programme 2026-29: Opposition

Debate contribution by Mr Tom Buchanan on 10 June 2025.

MLA

Mr Tom Buchanan

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

10 June 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Nutrients Action Programme 2026-29: Opposition

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5001175

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Today's debate is on one of the more important issues to come before the House. The motion calls on the Minister:

"to immediately withdraw the current public consultation"

on the NAP proposals. I know that the Minister would see that as a U-turn, but I remind him that he did a U-turn on continuing support for the mushroom sector during the Committee's deliberations on the Agriculture Bill. We welcome that — there is no shame in it — and I encourage him to do likewise today by withdrawing the consultation. The proposals, if implemented, would have devastating consequences for the agriculture industry, forcing many small family farms out of business and damaging our agri-food sector, which, today, is the envy of many around the world. The lack of engagement of the Minister and his Department with the farming community on the proposals — blatantly ignoring its concerns — is nothing short of appalling. When the Minister responds to the debate, he may well claim to be the farmers' friend and that he is working for them. He may beat his breast when declaring that he, the farmers' advocate, is championing their cause, yet actions always speak louder than words, and his actions to date contradict his words. The Minister may seek to hide behind the consultation process, but, with proposals that will cause huge damage to our local agriculture sector, risking jobs, cutting livestock numbers and threatening Northern Ireland's ability to produce food, he is fooling no one. The consultation must be withdrawn.

For far too long, our farmers have been made environmental scapegoats.

The consultation fails to deal with the real issues. Our farmers live and work on the land and are fully committed to good environmental practices and improving water quality, as they have been for the past number of years. However, the NAP proposals are totally unbalanced and completely disconnected from the reality of farming in Northern Ireland. Farmers are not ignorant of their environmental responsibilities: they want to be part of the solution when it comes to protecting our environment. However, they need a fair, balanced and workable plan, which they, alongside environmental groups, community groups and other agencies, have had input into, in order to develop policies that are fair, practical, workable and sustainable for the industry and the environment.

What we have in the NAP proposals is far from that.

The issue requires a constructive working relationship with the Department and other agencies that is built on understanding, trust and mutual respect. Unfortunately, the Minister has closed the door of engagement on the NAP proposals to the farming community. Rather than investing in practical support and building trust, he is on the road to creating more red tape and penalties and increased bureaucracy in an already complicated system with which our farmers are doing their best to comply. The NAP proposals are all about what farmers must do. When you look at the consultation, you see that it is all about what they must do. They must do this, they must do that, and they must do the other thing. I have seen no proposals or recommendations about what NI Water must do about the huge amount of pollution that it pumps into our waterways, yet our farmers are continually targeted. As I said in Committee, a University of Oxford study has shown that the sewage that was coming from water companies and NI Water into our waterways was causing much more damage than anything that was coming off the land. Yet, there are no proposals or recommendations —.

I will.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Yes, I fully agree with the Member. The Minister is failing in his responsibility to take on the issue and deal with it. Minister, it is time for you to wake up to reality and —

— begin to show some support for the farming community, which is the backbone of our rural economy, rather than continue to devise plans to destroy it completely. To date, Minister, you have failed to get to grips with the TB crisis and the delivery of a robust ammonia strategy. It is time that you began to take accountability for the significant failings of your Department on your watch. I have been a Member of the House since 2003, and I have never seen a Minister from any Department bring forward proposals to do with any sector under their Department's remit that have such devastating consequences for that sector as we have here. Folk around the Chamber, I say this to you: it is time that we stood shoulder to shoulder with the farming community by supporting the motion. Let us put politics to the side. It is too important.

Let us stand shoulder to shoulder with our farming community in opposition to the proposals.

803 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:42 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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