Bad Gerdgment

I'm not a qualifield commentator, but I'm pretty well convinced that Hillary Benn has got it wrong with his badger decision.

He has been dithering over the issue for so long that I thought it inconceivable that he would not allow some licenced controls of badger populations on livestock farms.

Now I'm wondering if he had made his mind up and was just buying time.  It is easy now to suspect that he never intended to allow badgers to be culled and that he was praying to be moved to a new cabinet position before he was forced into a decision. 

It must be hard to be a politician.  When we interviewed Benn for the podcast in January, he was pondering the decision and he came across as a reasonable and considerate man trying to hear the views of all parties.  My feeling then was that he had not been a natural sympathiser for British farmers but that he was trying to be fair.

Now I'm not so sure.  His comment in the House of Commons yesterday that he knew farmers affected "would be disappointed and angry" seemed to me to be an admission that he had failed them.

I believe that Blair and Brown's governments have brought some positive changes to this country but where agriculture has been concerned, I can't think of a single helpful decision that they have made.  I once believed that this was the fault of the agricultural industry for presenting an unprofessional face to government.  If that ever was the case, it certainly isn't now - the industry has worked very hard (and in difficult circumstances) to transform itself.  We have jumped through every hoop presented to us.  We have embraced environmental stewardship and demonstrated self-regulation through hundreds of schemed like the Voluntary Initiative, Assured Produce and LEAF.   

Whenever they have had a choice, the government has always acted against the interests of food producers. Ultimately this is acting against voters.  While the government continues to take food production for granted, they are in danger of exacerbating an already serious situation.

UK consumers will pay for the incompetence of these tits for a very long time to come.