Farm leader predicts fresh protests
27 December 2000
Farm leader predicts fresh protests
by FWi staff
PROTESTS by farmers against high fuel taxes could resume within days, according to David Handley, chairman of the Farmers for Action pressure group.
Mr Handley, a protest leader who helped blockade oil terminals across Britain last September, made the prediction in an interview with Farmers Weekly.
Asked what the New Year would bring for British farmers, Mr Handley said: “New protests over the state of farming and fuel tax could begin in January.
Farm suicides were rising and he felt that ancillary businesses, including oil companies and supermarkets, were putting profit before peoples lives.
Mr Handley said Chancellor Gordon Brown had done too little to prevent further protests despite freezing fuel tax on certain vehicles last November.
“The government offered virtually nothing over fuel, and what they did has
been absorbed already. We still have a government that wont listen.
A convoy of agricultural vehicles coming to London could be one option, except this time we will catch them by surprise.”