Our old friend Sir Paul yesterday launched a campaign called Meat Free Monday - designed to encourage people to eat vegetarian at least on day a week.

Good letter in today's Independent in response:

After checking my organic sheep and cattle this morning, listening to curlews and skylarks wheeling over their nests in the pastures my livestock maintain and watching the bumblebees working over the hay meadows which provide their winter fodder, I opened my Independent and choked on my porridge ("McCartney urges 'meat-free days' to tackle climate change, 15 June)

Here were a bunch of ill-informed, gas-guzzling, jet-setting "celebrities", who probably fly more often to New York or LA than I drive my low-emissions car to the local market town, attacking what I do. What prize patsies they make for the coal, power and aviation industries in passing the blame for global warming from fossil fuels to the eating of beef and lamb. We should be more discerning about the quality and sourcing of all our food. It is fundamentally dishonest to take the world's most shocking examples of deforestation, factory farming and water and energy inputs, then to imply that all meat is produced by means of a hypothetical mix of all of these unacceptable methods.

In reality over half of the UK's farmland is unsuitable for cropping, so centuries of pastoral farming are to a huge degree responsible for our finest landscapes and for locking up millions of tons of carbon in our grassland.

It is the rapid acceleration of carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels which poses a threat to the planet. In contrast, emissions from our cattle and sheep have been falling as their numbers have dwindled in recent decades.

I am serious about climate change, but because I am not a "celeb" I can only act locally by, for example, heating my home entirely with fallen wood I have cut myself, using a 100 per cent renewable electricity supplier and taking, at most, one (short-haul) flight per year. Whether through ignorance or cynicism, those promoting "Meat-free Monday" are abusing their high profiles while ignoring their own massive carbon footprints. They are reducing this critical issue to a dishonest farce.

Aidan Harrison

Rothbury, Northumberland

Isabel Davies:

Here were a bunch of ill-informed, gas-guzzling, jet-setting "celebrities", who probably fly more often to New York or LA than I drive my low-emissions car to the local market town, attacking what I do

Thanks for sight of this letter Isabel. It sums up nicely what, I guess, many of us think about the wealthy celebs of modest talent but which have been paid handsomely for it.

Speaking for myself, I would like a McCartney free day and, whilst I am at it, just one day a week free from all those chattering, prattling groups who appear to get air time totally out of proportion to their number or their logic.

Our arable editor lives quite close to Macca down in Kent (he assures us that his house is much smaller than Sir Paul's but I'm not so sure ). When I told him about this campaign he coughed and spluttered and said that Macca seemed to fly an awful lot over his house by helicopter which had to be far more damaging than eating meat.

 But surely the Earth is actually cooling not heating up?  Sunspot activity is falling and  that in turn is linked  with  temperatures back here on Earth.  Read Christopher Booker's page in the Sunday Telegraph and make your own mind up.

I'm led to believe that there is some quite interesting stuff on climate change coming out on Thursday. The government is releasing its latest forecasts to 2080 and they could be along the lines of this article in The Times from a couple of weeks ago.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6446236.ece  

 PS I have to say I take anything I read on Booker's page with a pinch of salt. He may be right on this issue, but I've seen stories of his that I just can't agree with and so it has rather clouded my view of his stuff.

Isabel Davies:

old friend Sir Paul

I am often wonder if there are animal products in hair dye for men. I have never been interested in colouring my hair so don't know. As the old boy (born in 1942) seems to have remarkable hair colour I think he may very well be using some of the makeover stuff.

All they people are nutters.Why whould you want to turn vegitarian?

they dont think that if the world went vegitarian there would be no lambs,sheep,calfs,cattle,piglets,pig,chicks,chickens and so on.The reason for that would be because they are not profitable.Farmers would start turning every acre into arible to make money.Farmers are NOT going to keep live stock to look sweet and pritty in the english countryside just so the idiots can admire them.

They had outar go and live on the moon!

I have a good saying  SAVE A COW,EAT A VEGITARIAN.

 I have always had a big gripe with so called veggies.

Do they drink milk ? if so how do they think we get a cow to produce milk without producing a calf which will then be reared for meat.

Do they wear leather shoes or have a leather settee, may be Sir Paul has leather seats in his helicopter ?

The list is endless, but at the end of the day its everyone's own choice. Its just a pity that that the majority of them don't see the bigger picture.

I also note that Miss lumley is supporting this campaign. What a surprise!!!  Richard Branson is also supporting it. Doesn`t he have a few planes?

Isabel Davies:

 PS I have to say I take anything I read on Booker's page with a pinch of salt

Isabel. I know C Booker and he has featured my daughter's business which was subject to one of the unintended consequences of this government's meddling in company law. By and large, his is a voice that is grossly under represented in the written and TV media today. I always read him and am prepared, most often, to give him the benefit of the doubt. His sources, particularly on Europe appear good and I like the way he, and his colleagues in Global Britain and Eurofacts (now being revamped) quote chapter and verse from treaties etc, and also quote statements from Euro leaders and bureaucrats.

Booker is a ready target for bureaucrats and they constantly try to trip him from time to time. However, when they challenge his facts directly he seems to be able to support his view. Without doubt, if they could silence him they would.

No doubt he has failings and occasional faulty interpretation and analysis, but the things he says need to be said and I don't hear many others saying them.

Some German scientists (I forget the source, as I have a life to live and cannot chase up everything I read) a few months back said the world was cooling but that this was only a temporary thing and that it would get back to heating up by 2015.

Peter Wells:

Isabel Davies:

 PS I have to say I take anything I read on Booker's page with a pinch of salt

Isabel. I know C Booker and he has featured my daughter's business which was subject to one of the unintended consequences of this government's meddling in company law. By and large, his is a voice that is grossly under represented in the written and TV media today. I always read him and am prepared, most often, to give him the benefit of the doubt. His sources, particularly on Europe appear good and I like the way he, and his colleagues in Global Britain and Eurofacts (now being revamped) quote chapter and verse from treaties etc, and also quote statements from Euro leaders and bureaucrats.

Booker is a ready target for bureaucrats and they constantly try to trip him from time to time. However, when they challenge his facts directly he seems to be able to support his view. Without doubt, if they could silence him they would.

No doubt he has failings and occasional faulty interpretation and analysis, but the things he says need to be said and I don't hear many others saying them.

Some German scientists (I forget the source, as I have a life to live and cannot chase up everything I read) a few months back said the world was cooling but that this was only a temporary thing and that it would get back to heating up by 2015.

I certainly think he has a role and like you say there aren't many others doing it. Someone keeping a watching eye on officialdom has got to be a good idea.

However, I just don't share his view of the world on some issues ie global warming.

just because the jumped up one time junky has written a few songs he thinks he can tell others what to do, when his 1st wife was ill all the ethics went flying out the window in an effort to find treatment to cure her

I think we should have a more meat friday!

if the veggys dont eat meat on fridays they should be made to skin a rabbit.

That'll show mcartney.

we should make him shoot one of the deer in his leuge land in upton if he doesnt eat meat on fridays.

The man is rocking English tradition, doesn't he realise Monday is cold meat from  Sunday's roast with bubble and squeak with chutneys, pickled onions, olives....

you never hear about maccas animal cruelty on kintyre.

they thought dipping was cruel, castration also, so they banned it on their land.

they had scabby sheep siring lambs by their own offspring.

i think its all tidied up now, but it was a mess.

somebody should measure his carbon footprint.

grazing cattle and sheep will still be there long after macca and the gas guzzlers are gone.

I have a meat-free monday if you don't count the Lamb or the Steak or the Chicken or the Bacon...

~Meggiewes~

Bubble and squeak umm fattening!!!!!

paddington bear:

The man is rocking English tradition, doesn't he realise Monday is cold meat from  Sunday's roast with bubble and squeak with chutneys, pickled onions, olives....

OI McCARTNEY - LET IT BE, us farmers work 8 DAYS A WEEK and WE CAN'T WORK IT OUT why a DAY TRIPPER like you is acting like THE FOOL ON THE HILL.

RUN FOR YOUR LIFE, take a MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR in your YELLOW SUBMARINE down a very LONG AND WINDING ROAD.

BECAUSE WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS, IVE GOT A FEELING your NOWHERE MAN and perhaps ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE, BECAUSE ITS ALL TO MUCH.

A FRIENDLY MESSAGE FROM ME TO YOU.

henarar:

Bubble and squeak umm fattening!

who cares as long as it tastes good.

I enjoy a well cooked  vegitarian meal, so long as it is accompanied by a nice steak or a few chops!

I celebrated meat free Monday with an early morning fry up, eggs bacon and sausages, cold meats for lunch and a big BBQ  for supper. I will continue to husband the land under my care with livestock being an integral part of the management, and will continue to ignor the opinions of the ignorant.

ak:

OI McCARTNEY - LET IT BE, us farmers work 8 DAYS A WEEK and WE CAN'T WORK IT OUT why a DAY TRIPPER like you is acting like THE FOOL ON THE HILL.

RUN FOR YOUR LIFE, take a MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR in your YELLOW SUBMARINE down a very LONG AND WINDING ROAD.

BECAUSE WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS, IVE GOT A FEELING your NOWHERE MAN and perhaps ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE, BECAUSE ITS ALL TO MUCH.

A FRIENDLY MESSAGE FROM ME TO YOU.

I have no problem with vegetarianism if thats how you choose to fuel your body, but what I can't stand is all these militant, agressive vegetarians who presume to treat me as the enemy just because I eat meat. If McCartney is seriuos about saving the world, tell him to put his helicopter in the shed, get on the train and leave me to enjoy my steak in peace! I think there are far bigger issues to deal with than how much a cow farts in a day!

farmer hill:

 

"how can you do that nowing it was running around happely only yesterday"I replied it wasnt for long because it was shot in one of the fuirst drives of the day.

Quality..

 Perhaps the sagely scouser might like to volunteer to assist in the slaughter of all the surplus cattle and sheep his little plan would necessitate, because otherwise, these ruminant delinquents will continue to hoover up the world's valuable resources whilst farting and belching the planet to the edge of oblivion serving no discernable purpose whatsoever; and then by the same logic he might  like to turn his attention to the millions of wild deer,antelopes and wildebeest that, by dint of evolution, are also complicit in this global orgy of methane generating madness.

When the acid-addled loon decides to reduce his personal carbon footprint to below that of your  average european pensioner then maybe he might just have earned sufficient moral authority to opine on how the rest of us should go about saving the planet.

Right...time for a double sausage and egg McMuffin! methinks

devil's advocate:

Perhaps the sagely scouser might like to volunteer to assist in the slaughter of all the surplus cattle and sheep his little plan would necessitate, because otherwise, these ruminant delinquents will continue to hoover up the world's valuable resources whilst farting and belching the planet to the edge of oblivion serving no discernable purpose whatsoever; and then by the same logic he might  like to turn his attention to the millions of wild deer,antelopes and wildebeest that, by dint of evolution, are also complicit in this global orgy of methane generating madness.

When the acid-addled loon decides to reduce his personal carbon footprint to below that of your  average european pensioner then maybe he might just have earned sufficient moral authority to opine on how the rest of us should go about saving the planet.

Right...time for a double sausage and egg McMuffin! methinks

Ha! Brilliant! I wonder if your sentiments can be forwarded on to the "Loon" in question and some sort of response gleaned from him? One for Isabel perhaps?