Food shortage plans drawn up as farmers threaten to strike
Fears of empty supermarket shelves and panic buying if farms withhold production
Ministers are drawing up contingency plans to deal with food shortages if farmers go on strike over the Treasury’s inheritance tax raid on farms.
Louise Haigh, the Transport Secretary, said the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) would set out contingency plans to ensure food security over the winter and summer.
It came as an environment minister urged farmers to “look calmly” at government tax plans that will see farming assets worth more than £1 million hit with a 20 per cent levy when inherited.
Farmers plan to descend on London in their thousands on Tuesday to protest against plans that they claim will destroy or break up family farms across the country.
Some farmers are threatening to go on strike and stop food production to give ministers a taste of what it would be like if the UK food-producing sector were no longer operating.
The threat has raised concerns about empty supermarket shelves this winter and potential panic-buying, last seen at the start of the Covid pandemic when people began to stockpile food at home.
On Sky’s Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, the presenter asked Ms Haigh about these concerns. She replied: “Of course, Defra will be setting out plans for the summer, for the winter – and setting out … contingency plans, and ensuring that food security is treated as the priority it deserves to be.”
On Saturday, Sir Keir Starmer used a speech to the Welsh Labour conference to defend Rachel Reeves’s Budget, and to insist that he would not be backing down on any of the measures she had announced, despite mounting criticism over the family farm tax and the rise in employer National Insurance contributions.
Farmers besieged the conference in tractors as Sir Keir was speaking. Defending the Prime Minister, Ms Haigh said: “What Keir Starmer laid out to our colleagues at the Welsh conference yesterday was a defence of the Budget.”
She added: “None of us came into power to levy taxes on farmers.”
Noting that she had friends and family in the farming sector, she said: “We do understand concerns, and we appreciate how hard farmers work.” But she insisted that the family farm tax was “fair and proportionate”.
Daniel Zeichner, the farming minister, told BBC Politics East: “I urge people to look calmly at the detail and I think they will find that the vast majority will be fine.
“The figures from the Treasury are very clear: under 500 farms a year are likely to be affected and I would say to people: take advice because every person’s situation is different and there will be many, many people who will find they are not actually going to be caught by this.”
However, Gareth Wyn Jones, a north Wales farmer and a popular YouTuber, accused Sir Keir of “fleeing out of the back door like a flipping rat” after the Prime Minister avoided speaking to farmers or addressing their concerns in his speech.
Adrian Ramsay, the co-leader of the Green Party, said that the Government should rethink its inheritance tax changes.
He told The House magazine: “The Government’s got into a muddle over its figures, and there’s disagreement between different departments about how many farms would actually be caught up by this planned tax.”
“The Government needs to have another look at what it’s got planned and be able to make a clear distinction between people who are speculating in buying up land and actual family farms.”
Meanwhile, Tom Bradshaw, the president of the National Farmers’ Union (NFU), claimed that he did not support the idea of withholding produce in protest at the tax.
Mr Bradshaw said: “I don’t for one moment condone that anyone will stop supplying the supermarkets.
“We saw during the Covid crisis that those unable to get their food were often either the most vulnerable, or those that have been working long hours in hospitals [such as] nurses.
“That is something we do not want to see again, but this is in the Government’s control: they can sit down, they can talk to us and work a way through this.”
He continued: “That is not an NFU tactic – we do not support emptying supermarket shelves – but I do completely understand the strength of feeling that there is amongst farmers.
This article (Food shortage plans drawn up as farmers threaten to strike) was created and published by The Telegraph and is republished here under “Fair Use” with attribution to the authors Charles Hymas and Genevieve Holl-Allen
Featured image: Demonstrators brought tractors, slurry tankers, lorries and 4x4s with trailers to make their voices heard Getty
••••
The Liberty Beacon Project is now expanding at a near exponential rate, and for this we are grateful and excited! But we must also be practical. For 7 years we have not asked for any donations, and have built this project with our own funds as we grew. We are now experiencing ever increasing growing pains due to the large number of websites and projects we represent. So we have just installed donation buttons on our websites and ask that you consider this when you visit them. Nothing is too small. We thank you for all your support and your considerations … (TLB)
••••
Comment Policy: As a privately owned web site, we reserve the right to remove comments that contain spam, advertising, vulgarity, threats of violence, racism, or personal/abusive attacks on other users. This also applies to trolling, the use of more than one alias, or just intentional mischief. Enforcement of this policy is at the discretion of this websites administrators. Repeat offenders may be blocked or permanently banned without prior warning.
••••
Disclaimer: TLB websites contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to our readers under the provisions of “fair use” in an effort to advance a better understanding of political, health, economic and social issues. The material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving it for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material for purposes other than “fair use” you must request permission from the copyright owner.
••••
Disclaimer: The information and opinions shared are for informational purposes only including, but not limited to, text, graphics, images and other material are not intended as medical advice or instruction. Nothing mentioned is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment.
Leave a Reply