Why Country Life is wrong

I hate people who are permanently "disgusted of Tunbridge Wells".

You know the sort - the little band who are perpetually offended and outraged. They love nothing more than being shocked and indignant and want the whole world to know quite how shocked and indignant.

This morning, though, I am a little shocked and indignant. I am disgusted (even if not of Tunbridge Wells). I've just read the Agromenes column in this week's Country Life.

It's ranting about the HSE's latest farming campaign (Come Home Safe) which has seen 'promise packs' sent out to farmers.

The pack contains a "Promise Knot" of farm baling twine - they idea being that they pin them somewhere prominent to act as a visual reminder of the pledge to 'come home safe'.

Agromenes ridicules this campaign - refers to the "idiocy" of it, dismisses it as "nonsense", dubs it "nannying".

This attitude is at best misguided and, at worst, irresponsible. Agriculture may be inherently more dangerous than most other occupations - but many of the accidents that happen are preventable.

Talk to farmers and they're the first to admit that it's in the seconds when their concentration slips, in those momentary lapses of judgement, when things go wrong and lives are lost. Anything that can be done to remind farmers and their families of the dangers - and keep the safety message uppermost in their mind - should be applauded.

The HSE, like all government departments, can be bureaucratic at times. But ultimately what they're trying to do is save lives.

I think I might write to Country Life. Signing off "Yours Disgusted", of course...