Olly Glover

Food and good land stewardship for nature, environment protection and, indeed, our enjoyment are not luxuries, but essentials. Agriculture has enormous economic potential: the industry supports 334,000 jobs in the agriculture labour force alone and sits at the centre of the wider agrifood industry, which is worth more than £153 billion. Agriculture also supports many other industries, such as feed, energy, fertiliser, chemicals, logistics and professional services, with £20.9 billion of intermediate inputs, yet the sector seems to be treated as a luxury, rather than as something totally essential to everything that we need in our country to succeed, and farmers do not get the attention and consistent and coherent support from Government that they deserve. Even before the latest sustainable farming incentive farce, farmers in my Oxfordshire constituency already faced so many challenges and headwinds. Given their role in causing many of those problems, it is rather concerning that the Conservatives seem to be suffering from more amnesia than was portrayed in Christopher Nolan’s “Memento”. The challenges faced by farmers include: the current Labour Government’s agricultural and business property tax relief changes; the uncertainty and impact of Brexit; trade deals based on proving the so-called benefits of Brexit, no matter the impact on our farmers; constantly changing Government incentive and payment regimes; the impact of recent worldwide inflation on fertiliser prices and equipment costs, now made even worse as a result of Trump’s idiotic middle east war; labour shortages also as a result of Brexit; pressures from the supply chain driving down prices for produce; and the worsening impact of climate change, which we have seen particularly gravely this year.