To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what representations he made to Commissioner Ray MacSharry to seek to ensure that environmental protection measures are linked closely with production and budgetary reforms to the common agricultural policy being discussed by European Commissioners.

As my right hon. Friend the Minister made clear in his reply to the hon. Member for Bosworth on 23 January at column 247, we did not have the opportunity at the last meeting of the Agricultural Council to give our views on the EC Commission's ideas for reforming the common agricultural policy, but at next week's Council we intend to argue for the closer integration of agricultural and environmental policies.