The long awaiting referendum vote is finally near. After listening to each side bang on with less than accurate figures and statistics; making most of them looking like complete buffoons to think that they can pull the wool over the voters eyes, it’s time to decide.
Joining the European Community in 1973 with its half a dozen wealthy countries, is a far cry from today's mega state with its 28 members. Britain's wealth has seriously diminished as a result, not to mention the massive rise in the population due to free movement.
As a farmer we have been looked after well by being part of Europe with its Common Agricultural Policy. It was successful in achieving its goals of plentiful food at a time of need after the World Wars. Without the militant French farmers, farm payments would have diminished or ceased in the 1980s when farmers finally turned famine and hunger, into feast and humongous and embarrassing food mountains.
Brussels dictates our everyday life on the farm, from the crops we can grow to the ones we can’t. Natural England, led by the EU, has taken this on board with its new Countryside Stewardship Scheme to protect the wildlife and have also upped the hoop-jumping we have to go through. Just to be on their scheme, that we didn’t want to join, they now require a forest full of paperwork, photos of every field, ditch, tree and hedge; along with wanting to know the number of sheep and cows in each field throughout the year!
Our farm would be farmed completely differently without all this interference and probably would include very few, if any, livestock on it. Joseph Stalin would have been impressed how the "free" world had achieved this level of dictatorship in a country that is a democracy!
So do we vote out and risk losing all our farm payments that the business depends on, or stay in and see our great country's independence diminish yearly until we can’t cough or sneeze without asking Brussels first?
It appears from the signs adorning farm land around Rye, that I am not alone in thinking that the endless rules and bizarre regulations that accompany farm payments are causing more time and stress than they are worth. The polls in the farming press are indicating well over 70% of farmers want out. The reality is that this will probably not be enough and our hopes will all but fade come June 24.
Simon Wright is a farmer at East Guldeford where he and his wife Ann also run holiday cottages. Click here to visit their website
Photo: Library image
