Those two words, food and farming are intimately linked.
Now, the UK Government is preventing Westminster MPs from voting on a House of Lords amendment to the Agriculture Bill. Thus, the planned UK Trade and Agriculture Commission will not be empowered to protect food and animal welfare standard in the UK.
An unending stream of underhand tactics, lies, rule breaking, shortcuts, manipulation and deceit power this Conservative Government. They are ushering in low standards, cheap imports and industrial farming practices that will be bad for animals, bad for humans and bad for the environment.
The Agriculture Bill provides the legislative framework for the replacement of agricultural support schemes in place during EU membership. For some people, the Brexit project was about cutting red-tape in the belief that bureaucracy was the problem. So far, the post-Brexit world is presenting ever more complex bureaucracy producing poorer and poorer results at a greater cost than before.
National Farming Union’s president Minette Batters said: “We have the chance to become a global leader in climate-friendly farming, and neither farmers nor the public want to see that ambition fall by the wayside because our trade policy does not hold food imports to the same standards as are expected of our own farmers.”
The coming week will test if this UK Government is united with the majority of the public and farmers in not wanting to accept lower quality food imports or doesn’t give a dam.
John Vincent 