Farmer Focus: Meeting with minister to discuss Brexit
Mark Williams© Richard Stanton Our farmhouse breakfast was a great success – a wonderful way to promote British produce, raise money for charity and have a good time.
We accommodated close to 50 people on the Friday in two sittings. Across Wales, the Farmers’ Union of Wales (FUW) farmhouse breakfasts have been successful and raised a lot of money for the British Heart Foundation.
See also: Read more from the Livestock Farmer Focus writers
I was invited to Builth Wells showground to meet the Welsh secretary of state, Alun Cairns, and his undersecretary Guto Bebb to discuss Brexit.
A small number of industry representatives were present and an interesting discussion took place. Brexit will happen. By March 2019 we will be out of the EU.
We left the meeting with the prospect of a follow-up meeting with farm minister Andrea Leadsom in Wales sometime later this spring – or so I thought.
With 48 hours notice the following week, it was down to Cardiff to meet her at the Wales Office in Cardiff Bay.
I was pleasantly surprised by how well briefed she was on agriculture.
She certainly has a passion for Brexit and if she can deliver her vision for British agriculture outside the EU, I believe UK agriculture will have a strong future.
I sense, however, some naivety from Ms Leadsom about the task ahead and the mammoth job of negotiating deals. Devolution will also be a major issue to overcome.
Devolved governments
In 2019, all the EU laws will be transferred to the UK’s set of laws (for those thinking Brexit would mean less regulation). Due to our devolved governments, some of these will automatically get transferred to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and this is where some difficulty arises.
As a farmer I want a level playing field and the thought of having four different agricultural schemes in the UK is quite daunting.
I think we will need a UK-wide framework to maintain fairness and that a body more senior than Defra comprising all devolved nations would be a good starting point.
This may be the olive branch that Nicola Sturgeon and the devolved nations need to have a united British agriculture industry.
Mark and Helen Williams run 1,000 ewes and 40 suckler cows across 283ha of part owned and rented land.