New 'rural wall' MPs can show they are in tune with public priorities

This article, written by Lord Herbert of South Downs, Countryside Alliance Chairman, says that rural people can now make their voice heard to many of Labour's new MPs.

The new Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Steve Reed MP, has set out his department’s five priorities: cleaning up Britain’s rivers, lakes and seas; creating a roadmap to move Britain to a zero-waste economy; supporting farmers to boost Britain’s food security; ensuring nature’s recovery; and protecting communities from the dangers of flooding. This is an ambitious but focused agenda which will command broad support and which the Alliance can certainly welcome, one which accords with what Mr Reed told us in a well-received speech at the Future Countryside conference held just after the election was called.

The elephant in the room, of course, is Labour’s regrettable manifesto commitment to ban trail hunting. We will receive the first indication of whether this pledge will be prioritised next week, when the King’s Speech will set out the new government’s early legislative programme. But even if hunting isn’t mentioned, the Speech normally allows for “other measures” to be brought forward, and a Private Member’s Bill is also a real risk.

It would be an extraordinary commentary on the priorities of a new government which is, by its own admission, facing immense challenges if the divisive issue of hunting was swiftly resurrected. Hunting was banned two decades ago in a bitter conflict which wasted hours of parliamentary time and created a deep fissure between Labour and the countryside. Most objective commentators would agree that to return to a matter which has apparently already been dealt with would be a self-defeating distraction. As Lord Mandelson warned when speaking at the first Future Countryside event last year, Labour’s “message will not be heard if rural people feel we don’t understand them, or — worse — somehow want to pick a fight with them”.

Nevertheless, there will be huge pressure from interest groups, some activists and perhaps also some MPs to join this battle again, and indeed to mount new attacks, for instance on shooting. We saw repeated attempts to undermine rural pursuits in the last parliament, as well as in devolved legislatures across the UK, and these will not go away. The Alliance does not seek conflict with the new government, but we will not shrink from the fiercest opposition to any illiberal, unnecessary and ill-judged measures which are brought forward, and we are ready.

In part, however, the future of rural activities lies in our own hands. We must give no excuse for precipitate legislative action, and this means both upholding the highest standards of conduct and addressing areas of legitimate public concern, even when this is challenging to traditional ways of doing things. We must be able to demonstrate that rural activities are properly conducted, well-regulated and need no attention from government.

Labour’s big majority conceals an electoral truth, which is that many of the party’s new MPs now hold rural seats with shallow majorities. These new ‘rural wall’ MPs now have the opportunity to show their electors in the countryside that they are in tune with public priorities, but equally rural people now have the means to make their voice heard through local connections which, when Labour largely only represented urban areas, simply didn’t exist before.

For Labour, this could be an important moment to rebuild trust with rural communities which will last beyond one parliament. The question is whether they will blow the chance by picking the fight which Lord Mandelson has warned them against. Before the election, in a welcome change of tone, both Sir Keir Starmer and Steve Reed said that Labour would show new respect for the countryside. That is the standard which the new government has set for itself, and which the Alliance – and everyone who lives and works in the countryside – will measure them by.

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