Sir Geoffrey Cox

I will indeed, Sir Mark. We do not need pyres 200 feet tall to see the invisible toll of carnage that cattle slaughter after bovine TB entails. I urge the Minister to remain open minded. Finally, I come to the Fursdon review. I know the Minister understands that none of my remarks are intended to be personal—on the contrary; he is a reasonable interlocutor with whom it is always a pleasure to deal, and who has always consulted on matters of constituency and other regional importance. The Fursdon review is one such matter. I urge him to implement its recommendations in full. The review was superbly conducted and has been an extraordinarily valuable exercise in how light can be brought to difficult situations. I applaud the appointment of the chairman of the Dartmoor Land Use Management Group and thank the Minister for that—that is good. I invite him to come to Tavistock for the next Dartmoor forum, where we have several hundred attending: the NFU, Devon Wildlife Trust and all the environmental groups will come. It is an important moment when the actors, the players and those involved on Dartmoor can see how this Government are as engaged as the last Government were in finding solutions to the uplands problem on the moor. I conclude with this plea: if it was not an intentional weather creation, leading farmers up and down the country and throughout Devon to believe that this Government have no interest, no regard and no care and are in fact callous and indifferent to their welfare and fate, it is up to the Minister today and henceforth to change that weather by sending the correct signals. I have to say he will have a hard job and an uphill battle to persuade them after the inheritance tax relief and the other measures of which I have spoken, but if anybody in this Government can do it, it is the Minister. I hope he will, and I wish him success in doing so.