Maria Caulfield, MP for Lewes and a Eurosceptic is not a ‘snarling dog’, and I am certain she is without ‘balls’, though I would say she has more than some MPs I could mention. And she certainly will not be running away even if a certain Parliamentary colleague did aim his shoe leather in her direction. And for the record I would add that I am neither ‘very old’, nor particularly ‘irrelevant’.

The referendum is exposing the more unpleasant side of certain individuals, but I suppose when your back is against the wall, it can bring out the worst in people.

Last week farmers from all sectors of the industry who believe that UK agriculture would be better off outside the EU launched ‘Farmers for Britain’. Farming Minister George Eustice, outlined how farmers will not be left without support after we Vote Leave. The EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is bad for farmers and bad for Britain. It is extremely bureaucratic, burdensome and has complex rules made by unelected EU officials who have no understanding or knowledge of the UK’s industry, climate and geography.

The Minister made it clear that as we pay twice as much into the EU budget as we get out; (in 2015 £5.5 billion for the CAP, but only received £2.9 billion back) farmers will continue to be comfortably funded after leaving the EU, as was done before we joined.

The economists are predicting that British farmers are facing a lean year with commodities including grain, milk, beef, lamb and pork prices remaining at rock bottom.

However the outlook for 2016 for cereals is possibly looking less bearish, as extreme weather induced by the El-Nino effect, could influence growing conditions in Australia and Asia, as well as in the USA and Europe. And before writing off exports to China and India it should be noted that, in 1997/98 China and India’s combined vegetable oil consumption was around 18.3 million tonnes. Consumption last year, just eighteen years later, was more than 56.2 million tonnes. 

With lower yields, and lower crop inputs in the face of poor profitability, and a global rising demand for ethanol as 75 million new cars were purchased last year, we can only hope this drives a recovery in the world demand for cereals. The USA exported ethanol and consequently reserves are now greatly depleted.
A world in which everyone has access to food at affordable prices should be a reality, or at the very least achievable. However, despite enough food being produced worldwide to feed all the people, over a billion suffer from chronic hunger.

Many factors in the developing world contribute to this problem including food waste, most significantly due to poor food distribution. It is vital to connect producers such as farmers and fishermen, to consumers, and to allocate the food accordingly. The challenge is deciding how the food will be distributed, who does it, and by what method.

There is a huge disparity in the world between people with adequate food and those starving or malnourished. The root causes are poor distribution, lack of infrastructure, unsustainable prices often driven by corruption and waste, inefficiency and poverty.

All these factors need to be addressed to create a world in which everyone has access to food at affordable prices, and of equal importance is that farmer producers receive a fair price for their products.
 
Things can quickly change down on the farm at this time of year. Already the crops are looking less stressed and the fields much healthier following their first top dressing of fertiliser. Crops have greened up and grown a good couple of inches, no doubt spurred on by the slightly warmer weather.
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The countryside is beginning to look neat and tidy as grass fields are harrowed and rolled, and spring crops sown. This glorious picture of the countryside emerging neatly from a tricky winter through the efforts of the farming community, is however badly let down by the shocking amount of rubbish along roadsides and hedgerows.  

A week in politics is a long time. As we watch the current car crash within the Conservative party with all its blood and guts laid open to public scrutiny, the media are rubbing their hands with glee.
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The fallout from the Budget and Ian Duncan Smith’s resignation will run for a few weeks, but the poisonous culture within the Conservative parliamentary party will become increasingly toxic as the European Referendum gets closer.

The facts indicate that IDS resigned on a point of principle, for which he should be admired. He has indeed worked tirelessly to liberate people from poverty by giving them the opportunity to work.
While the civil war rages within the Westminster bubble, the rest of us have to get on with our lives, no more so than out in the countryside. At last we have had a week without significant rain which has enabled farmers to get on with vital field work. 

Although dry it is still too cold for the arable crops and grass to come out of winter hibernation and start growing. Hopefully soon the soil will warm up, and some much needed sunshine will encourage growth. The fields look decidedly yellow as the relentless rain throughout the winter washed out most of the nutrients from the soil. It will be good to see things greening up.

Hopefully soon, with the help of an application of fertiliser, and a first spray to check inevitable disease, things will pick up. The good news is that the crops have established a good root system which bodes well for the growing season.

The cattle have come through the winter looking well, and fortunately we still have supplies of hay and straw in the barn, which we hope will last until turnout.

It seems extraordinary that an elderly woman whose brother’s savage murder on his farm, who became a symbol of Zimbabwe’s ethnic cleansing, is facing deportation from the UK because she ‘doesn’t know enough about Britain’. Yvonne Karussseit and her husband moved to the East Midlands six years ago from South Africa, to look after her frail parents. Since her father John Ford died, Mrs Karusseit who is paid £61-a-week carer’s benefit now looks after her dementia-stricken widowed mother. Now despite having passed the ‘Life in the UK’ exam with flying colours, the couple have been informed that they have been refused indefinite leave to remain in the UK. Mr Karusseit must give up his £42,000-a-year engineering job and Mrs Karusseit can no longer care for her mother who will now have to go into a care home, at huge cost to the state.

How sensible is that? It defies comprehension when decent hard working people like these are driven out of the country, while evil mass murderers, paedophiles, and individuals who are known by the authorities to be a threat, are allowed to remain due to ‘European’ human rights.

This is just one example which highlights the impracticalities and absurdity of falling over backwards to embrace European regulations which in reality compromise our security and is a burden on overstretched finances. People from outside the EU who are fully employed, speak English, contribute to their community and the exchequer, are unceremoniously thrown out. In this case because they failed to organise a test proving they can speak English! You could not make it up.

It is a shocking state of affairs when a father whose nine year old son had his arm broken, and eleven year old daughter was kicked, punched and her glasses stamped on by brutal bullies at school, is being ‘investigated’ by the police for approaching the parents of the chief bully to ask them to intervene.

As parents it is our duty to protect our children when their peers threaten their safety. These playground bullies turn into nasty adults, the police, the school and the authorities should be supporting Mr Cooper, I sincerely hope he receives an award, not a criminal record. 

​The medics and scientists are telling us that our homes and lifestyles are killing us. Modern day cleaning fluids, air fresheners, fabrics, dry cleaning chemicals and much besides are all contributing to the poor health of the nation, including diseases affecting our hearts and lungs, and are responsible for some forms of cancer.




The government, driven by the European Parliament, in an attempt to meet the commitments on climate change made under the Kyoto protocol, introduced the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, first published in 2002. This enhanced building regulations, and established the energy certification schemes for residential and work places.

The result of which, in many cases, and it should be noted that these powers are being widened, is that we are forced to live and work in buildings which are in effect hermetically sealed, which have now been identified by the experts as death traps.

The building regulations complying with the rules and regulations of the ‘directive’, are designed to ‘save the planet’. However they appear to have little regard for the people who have to live and work in them. The simple conclusion, according to the medics and scientists, must be that Brussels and the Government which introduced these building regulations which are mandatory, have created unhealthy living and working spaces which are responsible for an unhealthy population, and no doubt an additional strain on the NHS.
The days when we lived in houses with windows which did not fit, and every room had an open fire place which allowed the rooms to breathe, there were gaps in the rafters and a jolly good draft throughout the house are over.

Well not everywhere. Ote Hall must be an environmentalist’s worst nightmare. There are gaps in the rafters and some walls, excellent ventilation even when the windows are shut, outer doors which have a good inch gap beneath, and almost every room has an open fireplace. So with any luck we should remain a healthy lot!
It is all very well telling us we should get fit and live healthier lives; and I am sure the latest effort to persuade everyone to eat less and exercise more, is well intended. But if we do all of that and then sit in sanitised, air tight homes and offices, breathing in all kinds of noxious toxins, we certainly will not live long enough to enjoy our ultra-thin toned bodies.

I would not be at all surprised if before long the Government faces thousands of compensation claims as people realise that their failing health is partly connected to these directives, which have trapped them in homes and workplaces which are making them ill, and shortening life expectancy.

It is no doubt a worthy cause to reduce energy consumption, eliminating energy wastage, and improving efficiency. But, should the planet take precedence over the health and wellbeing of the people? It will be interesting to see if the two opposing sides of this dilemma take note that they are pulling in different directions. Time will tell.

It is surely doubtful that any club which has Tony Blair, Peter Mandelson and Alastair Campbell as members will attract a following. David Cameron must be mortified and deeply worried to see they have joined his team.

And the more I hear of foreign leaders such as Barrack Obama and Angela Merkel, and Jean-Claude Junker the President of the European Commission directing the British public on how to vote in the referendum, the more inclined I and many others will do the opposite.

Mr Cameron has turned his attention on the farming community, and has now said farmers will receive support from the UK Government, if we leave the EU. However he also said we would lose £330 million a year in beef and lamb exports. Can he be sure? Has he told his friends across the Channel not to trade with us in the future? Has Mrs Merkel promised him that she will tell her manufacturers and industrialists not to sell us their cars and other products?

I rather doubt any of the above is true or will happen. I think the Prime Minister is desperate and clutching at straws, as he knows farmers are an independent bunch, who have had enough of red tape and bureaucracy, and will stand up for our democracy and sovereignty. Yes, there are those who are concerned for their immediate financial future, but I would hazard a guess the majority will vote to protect our independence.

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​“We have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not combined. We are interested and associated but not absorbed. If Britain must choose between Europe and the sea, she must always choose the open sea”.
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These wise words were uttered by Winston Churchill, and they should perhaps be remembered by those who fail to see the bigger picture regarding our relationship now and in the future with Europe.

Many of the politicians who have now decided to support the Vote Leave campaign, some friends of David Cameron, had previously said that they would be prepared to remain in a Reformed Europe. And they trusted him to stand firm and demand major reforms. They believed he should deliver the restoration of the Sovereignty of the British Parliament and its powers to govern. The ability to control our borders, and a better deal on migrant benefits, among other things.

The deal the Prime Minister achieved fell well short of what he promised. It is astonishing that having said he would not rule out supporting a vote to exit the EU if he failed to deliver, he is now determined to persuade the British public that whatever the package, to leave is not an option.

So far there has been nothing that the Vote Stay has ‘threatened’ us with that would persuade me and many others to tick that box. As a livestock and arable farmer running a small business, a landlord of both residential and commercial properties, and as a parent looking to my children and grandchildren’s futures, and that of the United Kingdom, I want to ensure that we as a nation are in control of that future. Current EU rules make it impossible for research and development into GM to benefit British farmers by cutting costs, improving profitability and growing crops which will not require so much of the diminishing supplies of costly fertiliser and sprays. And how can we secure the jobs and growth that we need when vital contracts for the work go to preferred bidders on the continent and not to British firms? 

The real leap in the dark is to find that on 24th June our great nation is permanently tied into the European State. Those who believe that the European Union will remain as it is today are naïve. Once the Europeans have, thanks to David Cameron, locked the UK in, things will change. The leap will be into a dark hole out of which we cannot escape. The federalists will rise up, they will produce more legislation, the terms of membership will change, the power of Brussels will become greater, and the floodgates will open regarding migration.

Of course other EU leaders want the UK to remain, Great Britain was their greatest catch. They need us but it is certain that we do not need them.

The days of the Common Market and the Treaty of Rome are long gone. It is now about the power of a few over the many. It is about control, and shifting people of different cultures, languages and religions through open borders in a vain attempt to create a European utopia. Which will never happen.  

Brexit will not affect people’s jobs or living standards as the Chancellor George Osborne has threatened. What will affect jobs and living standards is the Chancellors inability to reduce the national debt, which has doubled since 2010.

Britain has for over two decades steadily increased its trade with non-European countries; so also has France and Germany. The USA is now Germany’s largest trading partner, and Europe as a trading group is stagnating and falling behind the rest of the world.

From October 2016 Turkey will be granted Visa Free Travel to the EU. A population of 75 Million Muslim Turks will be able to come to Europe, no questions asked. No wonder David Cameron is so keen to rush the referendum through rather than wait until 2017. This development will certainly not help our security if we remain in the EU.
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What Mr Cameron failed to do was take back real control from the unelected and unaccountable European Commission. As a democracy our politicians must be accountable to the people, and if they fail to deliver we can vote them out. And as Labour MP Kate Hoey said, ‘If we vote to leave, we can stop being Little Europeans and become Internationalists once again’.

​It is timely to recall Winston Churchill’s famous summary of Europe. “We have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not combined. We are interested and associated but not absorbed. If Britain must choose between Europe and the sea, she must always choose the open sea” – 2 March 2016

The fields are beginning to dry, and if we miss the showers this week, we could soon start on the list of jobs ‘to do’. They include harrowing and rolling the grass fields, and top dressing and spraying arable crops when the conditions allow.

The wheat from last year’s harvest has now all left the farm, and the remainder of the barley will leave this week. We had our annual TB test last week, which was fortunately clear and showed no reactors.
 
We should reach turnout with just enough hay and straw, but there are many livestock farmers who are already running short. Cattle were brought in earlier than usual last autumn when it became so wet.
 
Commodity prices continue to tumble, and there is no discernible magic light at the end of the tunnel. The financial whiz kids and future’s pundits are predicting that things will only get worse before they get better.
For farms which are dedicated to producing one commodity, be it milk, cereals, beef, sheep or pork, things are particularly tough. It is at times like these that small mixed farms with a good rotation, flexibility, slight of foot and the opportunity to diversify come into their own.
 
James Read a regular columnist in the Farmers Weekly reminds us that back in the early 2000s when prices were also hit hard, farm advisers were telling us to spread our costs by taking on more land, and specialise in one area. This was a time when many massive intensified arable units were developed.
 
Even then the smaller, mixed family farms able to cut costs dramatically, were making money, as they still can today. James reminds us of a timely old saying; “Profit is sanity, acres are vanity”.
 
Now in Lincolnshire and many mainly arable counties, increasingly farms are returning to mixed farming. They are restocking themselves, or employing sheep farmers to graze cover crops to be grown with arable crops in the spring.

If you want to keep your soil healthy with micro-organisms and enough organic matter to ensure good drainage and healthy fertility for the crops, land requires copious amounts of manure. Either being well grazed or by spreading farm yard manure.
 
As James Read says in his excellent article; perhaps if we had all stuck to mixed farming more, with everybody having a bit of everything (livestock/arable), our industry would not now be over-producing.
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In the days when most average sized farms were mixed, the surrounding villages had more farming people with local jobs. And the pubs had less civil servants and more down to earth hard-working farming customers.
 
Mixed farms are busy all the year round, with the farmer, his employees and the livestock about, all creating a lively atmosphere. However, if you drive into a large arable unit in the winter, there is no one about, the doors are shut and there is probably tumble weed blowing about the yard, as Mr Read so graphically describes.
 
Small dairy farms are selling their cows and looking to diversify as they are unable to survive in the current financial climate. The last of the dairy cattle in our parish will disburse this summer. Not so many years ago there were 20 dairy herds in and around Wivelsfield, by this summer there will be none. The work is relentless as the cows need milking twice a day, 7 days a week. It is sad but understandable as you cannot continue to work this hard only to sell the milk at a loss.
 
It is encouraging to hear that Defra minister George Eustice, unlike Liz Truss, does have a plan B if the UK leaves the EU after the summer referendum. His vision would be for a more farmer friendly area payment scheme that farmers could enrol on automatically, rather than having the chaos of an annual application process with a hard deadline. As he said, “There are lots of things you could do differently”.
 
That would be a good start, and his suggestion that Cross-compliance, a bureaucratic nonsense entwined by red tape, would be scrapped. British farmers are among the best in the world, we shall blossom and prosper; under the right leadership.
 
It is timely to recall Winston Churchill’s famous summary of Europe. “We have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not combined. We are interested and associated but not absorbed. If Britain must choose between Europe and the sea, she must always choose the open sea”.