Have your say, w/e 3 August, 2001
6 August 2001
Have your say, w/e 3 August, 2001
Stop the slaughter
WHY are we not vaccinating?
It worked in Holland, it works in the Argentine, so why will it not work here?
If they keep on with this maniacal slaughter there will not be any farming industry left in the UK.
Another worrying question: Do intelligent people really believe that killing all our livestock will destroy the virus? What about the wildlife which may be infected?
Nothing short of a nuclear holocaust will sterilise
our environment. Surely now is the time for the people of the UK to say enough is enough and demand an end to this idiotic and destructive slaughter policy.
Dick Lindley, Wakefield
dicklindley@birkwood.fsbusiness.co.uk
Destroying the fabric of the countryside
FARMING underpins the tourist and food industries, the landscape and the rural communities.
Throwing away the chance to hold an open debate on foot-and-mouth vaccination based on science and economics is proving to be the nail which lost the shoe which will destroy the very fabric of the countryside.
Our industry and nation deserve better leadership, less motivated by self-preservation and opportunism. Is there still time for the tail to wag the dog?
marshall.taylor@farmersweekly.net
Survival of Welsh sheep-farming
WHAT price the survival of Welsh sheep-farming?.
With the arrival of foot-and-mouth on the Brecon Beacons and the destruction of thousands of sheep and the “help” (!) from Mrs Beckett for the small hill lambs produced .
It would seem that before this goverment is finished, the only thing to be found on the hills of Wales will be bracken and hikers, which it seems is what they have
been aiming at since they came to power.
bryntaf@yahoo.com
Go back to the live auction
WITH slaughterers having the whip hand at present in determining primestock prices, without the competition and relative transparency of the livestock auction, will those producers who feel that they have been stitched up put all their fatstock through the auction ring, with a reserve and be prepared to take them home again when the foot-and-mouth crisis is over?
Only this way can we help ourselves to achieve a decent return, on beef particularly.
Learning what we already knew
LOOK at the Phillips inquiry and more recently the Bristol Royal Infirmary inquiry – years in the gestation, enormous expense, only serving to line the pockets of the lawyers to tell us what we already knew.
The Northumberland report should be dusted off and those responsible for the current shambles presented with a copy with their P45.
Farmers need to promote themselves
FOOT-AND-MOUTH is just another way for the government to get rid of farmers.
They would rather buy all they need abroad; our government is not interested in “smelly old farms”.
We need a high-profile campaign to promote our clean-living farmers and welfare-friendly produce. The Irish Republic has the right idea.
Samuel Chesney
samuel.chesney@ukgateway.net
Studying the human cost of the virus
I AM a degree student carrying out a study into the human
effects of the foot-and-mouth crisis.
If any farmers would be willing to be interviewed, whether their farms have had an outbreak or not could you please contact me.
I am ideally looking for farmers in the Wiltshire/Gloucestershire/Oxfordshire area. I already have some participants but would be very
grateful for more.
Catherine White
supercat65@hotmail.com
Cost of decontamination
HOW can it cost 100,000 on average to decontaminate foot-and-mouth farms in England? (Blair clamps down on virus clean-up, FWi, 23 July, 201)
This mornings news says it costs a third of that in Scotland, and much less on the Continent.
Looks like another racket or scandal in the foot-and-mouth saga.
Inquiry – whats the hurry, Ben?
WAS the NFUs decision not to support a public inquiry really unexpected? (Say yes to a public inquiry, FWi, 16 July, 2001)
What utter nonsense Bill Gill speaks when he says “the most important thing is speed, we need to learn lessons very quickly”.
Why? Is he expecting another outbreak? Do tell us, Mr Gill, if you have information that should be shared.
Its a very weak arguement against a public inquiry. I agree that public inquiries take far too long, as seen in the Phillips inquiry into BSE, but as David Handley, Farmers for Action chairman, says, “Nothing should be rushed and nothing should be missed”.
I wonder if the RSPCA would be mentioned in any inquiry?