LABOUR'S unpopular Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs faces a radical overhaul under Conservative plans to "put the heart" into countryside policy.

Defra needs "completely reorienting" to give farming and the environment equal status in Whitehall, Conservative frontbencher Nick Herbert said, as he pledged to put the "f" for farming back into government.

In the Saturday Interview he claims the department has experienced an "existential crisis" since it was set up in the wake of the 2001 foot and mouth crisis, and suffered at the hands of "one or two particularly useless ministers".

The shadow environment secretary claims Labour's attitude to the countryside is "near animus", condemns the expansion of unaccountable quangos and "strongly" backs the WMN Think Local campaign as an example of people valuing their local communities.

Final details of the shape of a new ministry have yet to be decided, with David Cameron keen to avoid accusations of "measuring up the curtains" in appearing to take a Conservative victory for granted. But Mr Herbert revealed Defra would not exist in its current form if Tories win the election, expected on May 6.

While insisting "these are matters for David Cameron" he makes plain his desire to see a radically different ministry. One option could include a new Department for Environment and Farming.

"Defra would be quite different under a Conservative government. Firstly we need to put the 'f' back into Defra. We need to put farming back in. Labour deliberately left out agriculture from the title.

"I see farming and the environment on an equal footing but with a high profile."

Defra was formed after the 2001 general election, when Tony Blair abolished the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. The new department took on responsibility for tackling climate change, leading to charges that successive ministers concentrated on globe-trotting missions to deal with carbon emissions at the expense of supporting domestic farmers.

In October 2008, it lost responsibility for climate change to a new department.

"I don't think it's the best named department," Mr Herbert said. "It has suffered a series of existential crises since it was set up. It was a shotgun marriage, then it had half of it taken away, it's had one or two particularly useless ministers.

"It needs to be given some heart because food production is really going to matter to the country in the future. No farms… no food."

While a new department might be given a higher profile, the Conservatives would wield the axe on its many agencies, which employ some 28,000 people. The RPA faces a major overhaul, with the minister for farming becoming chairman because "the administration has frankly been a disgrace".

Labour has faced repeated criticism in the past 13 years that it has failed to address the needs of rural areas with the same enthusiasm – and funding – as the urban heartlands more likely to vote for them. Post offices, pubs and shops have continued to disappear from village life while health services and schools have been centralised.

"The government starts from a position that it doesn't believe that these services matter and doesn't give two hoots what rural people think," Mr Herbert said.

He raises the prospect of the term "rural affairs" disappearing from the title of a Whitehall department altogether, after concerns it ghetto-ised the countryside and gave other big-spending ministries like the Home Office, and the education and health departments an excuse to ignore the rural concerns.

"Rural people are fed up with being treated like they are a marginal issue." Mr Herbert insists decline in domestic food production can be reversed, in part by cutting back "unnecessary red tape".

Defra is also responsible for policy on flooding, waste, recycling, air quality, water quality and conservation. "There is actually a broad quality of life agenda which has been lost and we need a strong department for the environment in order to promote that agenda too," he said.