Natural Environment and Rural Communities Bill

I declare an interest as the vice-president of the Council for National Parks and the president of the Friends of the Lake District, which represents CPRE in the whole of Cumbria, not just the national park. This debate is very important. I am sure that we would all very much like to put on record our appreciation for what the noble Lord has done to improve the countryside on his farm. However, I suggest that the people who have tabled the amendment are very honestly underlining an unnecessary difference which I believe the Government have sought to overcome with careful wording. The amendment suggests that we have all these beautiful qualitative things that we do in the countryside while somehow over here there is the real world of economic and social life, and that this new body must balance those two separate dynamics. What I think the Government have tried to say—for which I applaud them—is, ““Let us begin to think of this as an integrated process in which, in the very management of the countryside for the qualitative things that we are concerned about, we shall be looking to the economic and social well-being of the area and the people who live in it. We must stop thinking of this potentially as a confrontation. It is something that we must start thinking about as an integrated, integral combination of different elements in the total situation””. I have thought about this a great deal and I have a lot of sympathy with what has been said by those who have spoken to the amendment. However, I believe that the Government are taking us forward and bringing into the drafting a positive idea, which I support.