Ministers should consider offering the UK’s farmers an emergency aid package to help them cope with the effects of an exceptionally wet winter, a Somerset MP has argued.
Ian Liddell-Grainger said the farming sector was facing unprecedented levels of hardship as a result of weeks of above-average rainfall.
Seasonal operations such as ploughing and seeding had been delayed and there were widespread fears that harvest levels would be disastrous, leading to potential shortages of home-produced food.
Mr Liddell-Grainger, MP for Bridgwater and West Somerset, said there could be no more opportune moment for the Government to show it genuinely supported the nation’s farmers.
“I’ve lost count of the number of times I have heard it said but as I travel round my constituency I see little evidence of words being turned into actions,” he said.
“In Government speak ‘support’ seems to extend only to drawing up complex schemes to pay farmers grants some way down the line as long as they have the time to fill in all the paperwork themselves - or the money to employ someone to do it for them.
“But at the moment farmers don’t want more forms to fill in; they need hard cash going into their bank accounts so they can survive another trading year.”
Mr Liddell-Grainger said the weather had brought unprecedented problems for farmers.
“The ground is still too wet to plough, or to turn out livestock without it getting poached, and only a miracle is going to prevent a rich crop of farm failures this year. And miracles don’t happen all that often.
“I think the industry is now beginning to realise that other European states look after their farmers far better; place far more value on the work they do in producing food; and are ready to step in with emergency support when the weather starts heaping up operational costs to an unsupportable level.
“Here we have a Government whose only concern appears to be phasing out direct farm support and replacing it with a system which could almost have been designed to reduce income.
“Unless they want to see a catastrophic level of business failures in the sector this year ministers must consider a package of direct, no-strings support for the industry - and deliver it immediately.”
(Photograph - Geograph © Copyright Roger Cornfoot )
