Member

This group of amendments rightly challenges us to think more clearly about how the private market can be engaged in EDPs. Private markets are already experiencing a chilling effect from this Bill, as I and others have mentioned before. At a time when farmers and landowners are being financially pressured by the family farm death tax, as well as cuts to the delinked payments and the end of the SFI, it is absolutely essential that the door into these projects is wide open. I take this opportunity to ask the Minister whether she can update us on the progress of the introduction of the new SFIs that we were expecting this year.