On June 8 the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne outlined the Government’s approach to the Spending Review 2010. The Spending Review (SR) is due to be concluded in the autumn and it will set spending limited for every Government Department for the period 2011-12 to 2014-15.
As you will be aware the Chancellor announced savings amounting to £6.2 billion for the current financial year (2010-11) on 24 May. Defra's contribution to the 2010-11 savings amounted to £162m (5.5% of its budget).
In the announcement on 8 June the Chancellor published a document “the Spending Review Framework”. This documents sets out Governments plans for the SR and the steps it will take to deliver this. In the June Budget the Chancellor has said that the Government will set the overall path for public finances, including expenditure, over the rest of the Parliament. Download our NFU briefing here
What does this mean for the NFU and its members?
We need to make sure that any cuts to spending by Defra do not adversely affect the competitive position of British agriculture and horticulture.
We have a short window of opportunity to look ourselves at Defra programmes and do our own assessment of how they measure up to the criteria establish by the Treasury. We also have to be mindful that some of the options available to Defra involve transferring costs or responsibility for costs to farmers so we have to be absolutely clear that we cannot accept a position where Defra merely attempts transfer their costly inefficient systems which fail to meet the criteria set out by the Treasury to the industry.
If anyone has any examples of policy areas where you think Defra could cut spending please let us know by using the comments form below or emailing helen.cotterill@nfu.org.uk.
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