Lord Teverson (LD)

My Lords, I want to make two brief points. I was delighted to add my name to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, because it includes community gardens and allotments. My first point is that I agree about allotments. Down in Cornwall, I have been involved in growing schemes, in which communities come together on common ground to produce mainly vegetables and sell the surplus to the local community. These are fantastic schemes which are very sociable and bring people together. One of our objectives in the far south-west was to allow every community to have access to a growing scheme, so that is moving on, if you like, one stage further from allotments. My second brief point is again a reflection from the far south-west. There is somehow often an assumption that people in rural towns have easy access to green and blue spaces. If that is true anywhere, it would be in Cornwall. Believe me, I am never more surprised than when I find out that families in what we might describe as low-income, deprived areas do not get outside major town boundaries, and so areas of green space within all urban areas are incredibly important. I hope the Minister will take note of both those observations.