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We had other members who were saying, You cannot take a position, or, If you do take a position, it must be vote Remain, or, It must be vote Leave. Get personalized recommendations, and learn where to watch across hundreds of Which is very similar to what they do in countries like Australia and America. WebMinette met her husband Alec Walters while she was at Durham and they married in 1978. Youve got Defra, effectively, leading on border controls and things like export health certificates. We did still have the practical issue though to register as either Remain or Leave with the Electoral Commission so as not to fall foul of the impending spending limits on our activity. Defra had always been a slightly second, third, ranked department, partly because so much of its policy was run from Europe rather than domestically. The gnarly issues that remain today are still to be resolved, and who knows how we will resolve them. Australia is the sort of precedent FTA because that will be the first one, potentially, that is concluded. If you want to find a solution, youve got to pitch them as a solution and youve got to work out what that actually looks like. The coalition showed that this was about consumers, this was about everybody believing in it. UKICE: Rather intriguingly, George Eustice, given his background, put down one of the indicative votes proposing UK accession to EFTA. UKICE: One way of making that operation much easier would have been to sign up to alignment, or greater alignment, on SPS in the TCA, but none of that really seemed to come to fruition. We also knew that campaigning on either side, for a membership organisation, would be really counter-productive. There are a lot of things that need to be done. How are you going to do that? Of course, dont forget, then Covid-19 is hogging the news agenda, so its even harder to get your voice heard. As part of the British project 'Quick Reads', to encourage literacy amongst adults with reading difficulties, Walters wrote a 20,000-word novella called Chickenfeed. Northern Ireland are looking like they will carry on with the status quo. UKICE: In March 2019, Daniel Kawczynski said hed vote for the Withdrawal Agreement, given the negative prospects of no deal exit to the farming industry. When you look at this country, 70% of it is rural. It took two and a half years to write and was rejected by numerous publishing houses until Maria Rejt, Macmillan Publishers, bought it for 1250. Minette Batters, who is the president of the National Farmers Union (NFU) of England and Wales and has been called the most powerful farmer in the UK, was Do you think it signalled a significant change of direction? But of course, politically, it was enormously challenging. UKICE: We saw the very hostile reaction from EU political leaders to Chequers, but I wondered whether you got any sense from your sister bodies in France, Denmark, Netherlands, places that were concerned about UK lowering standards and the implications for that on agri-food farming, that they thought Chequers was quite a clever wheeze? They have two sons: Roland, who is married to Charlotte, and Philip, who is married to I think Im right in saying that we were one of the first trade bodies, across any sector, to commission economic analysis and absolutely the first in the agri-food space. We had a government that really believed you should take every decision up to the wire, and that was the way of getting a short-run better deal. minette batters familymilwaukee battery lights flashing back and forth minette batters family. Minettes goal is to make history as exciting and readable as any of her psychological crime thrillers. So, we put our energies into that, rather than trying to stop anything or have another referendum. Weve got significant issues with the absence of border control posts on the north European coast which means that we effectively cant move any farm animals from GB to mainland EU. They have two sons: Roland, who is married to Charlotte, and Philip, who is married to Sarah: and three granddaughters: Madeleine, Martha and Hermione. UKICE: At the moment, we have this sort of asymmetric border, dont we? Youve got to have agriculture as a key part of trade policy. Within four months, it had won the Crime Writers Association John Creasey award for best first novel and had been snapped up by 11 foreign publishers. You were looking at, I think it was David Dimbleby and at the arrows and thinking, No, that cant be right. Straight away she ruled out being part of the Single Market, and we had those big speeches at Lancaster House, Mansion House, that were hard-line Brexit positions. I went out to the Republic of Ireland to the massive ploughing match that they have, talked with the Irish Farmers Association, as we have done for our entire time, within COPA-COGECA, and also visited the Northern Ireland border and our colleagues in UFU. MB: It was a worry in the context of how it was set out. Minette Batters - President, National Farmers Union of England and Wales. Walters's third novel, The Scold's Bridle, then won the CWA Gold Dagger, giving her a unique treble. During a gap year between school and Durham University, 1968, Minette volunteered in Israel with The Bridge in Britain, working on a kibbutz and in a delinquent boys home in Jerusalem. WebBrowse 72 minette batters photos and images available, or start a new search to explore more photos and images. They, of course, looked at the Basic Payment Scheme (BPS) impact assessment in 2018, so were very much wanting them to look at that again. Her husband, Malcolm, is not involved I think Defra has very strong views on all of this, I know George Eustice does. I just wondered if this was done in concert with you was this George Eustice acting as the NFUs representative in Parliament? And I think the likes of Daniel Kawczynski, too, supported it, on that very basis. Verified account Protected Tweets @; Suggested users But certainly France and other countries put forward the same thing. And I think George Eustice described this as seeing me have a sort of nuclear moment, where I nearly erupted through the ceiling. That then was the reason for me saying at the Oxford Farming Conference in 2019, Actually, do you know what? Or did they think it was just a completely unacceptable attempt to cherry-pick the single market? Ultimately, when we look at the delinking process, you are going to see 50% of direct support that will be capped in four years. bubble tea consumption statistics australia. MB: In the end, as Deputy President of the NFU, I did take a public position, which was that, on the information we had, we would be better off remaining in the EU. UKICE: If you look at the whole period together, farming is obviously one of those areas where the big decisions used to be taken in Brussels, but theyre now being taken in a mix of London, Cardiff, Edinburgh. It is no good going to government, just saying, I want. Minette Caroline Mary Walters DL[1] (born 26 September 1949) is an English crime writer. Trade is such dry policy, that a lot of people, particularly in the media, were not taking the time to understand it. The government was clear it would not countenance food price inflation, so the Temporary Tariff Regime was conceived. MB: From the very beginning, weve been part of what have been called the F4 Groups. abril 26, 2023 0 Visualizaes jason elliott, newsom. Boris Johnson was operating from a seismic majority, and so they have the power base to do whatever they want. I guess we needed to be able to get our point of view across, recognising that it didnt necessarily fit that well with the mantra of Brexit is great, because its about cheaper food, cheaper clothes, which had been the mantra. But then he left. We had implemented laws that were based on food values, and yet we werent prepared to look at that in other parts of the world. There is a lot of detail that needs to be progressed, and rapidly, for farmers to feel confident to get onto the new platform for next year. So, when I went and had my second meeting with Theresa May, it was to discuss her Chequers proposal. But we had to get this right. Climate change is a global issue, weve got to be able to do it collaboratively, with others coming with us. Ive met with the Australian negotiating team, and they are absolutely determined that they should have free access on beef and sheep. I think its still yet to be resolved as to what that looks like. Views expressed in this piece are those of the author(s) and are not necessarily those of UK in a Changing Europe. That was pretty daunting, I think, for a lot of farmers. MB: There was an element of, Goodness, what is this going to look like? Minette Batters (MB): It was interesting, wasnt it, when Theresa May came in? We convened our council, our sovereign body, again, at a special meeting in London. We knew that we had to be able to inform our members of facts. On that basis, it was catastrophic. Minette Batters (MB): Well, George has been in Defra a long time. Yes, we did have very high-quality affordable food, the most affordable in Europe, the third most affordable in the world. This arguably makes her the most powerful farmer in the UK; she Have you been pressurising government-? Helped by her husband Edwin and son George, Jilly manages 600 acres on the River Exe floodplain, raising native breeds like South Devons and Red Polls. There are a lot of high standards in America. Trying to make sure that we had all areas of our membership covered was absolutely critical. The EU are now really having these positive conversations, and the Commission has come out positively, saying, Actually, on plant breeding, weve got to look at the opportunities around that resistant crop. So, it continues just to be a live issue that will have to be overcome, at some stage. If we go and dilute that massively, and have a flood of much cheaper imports, that is obviously going to undermine our farmers. In order to work through a process, people had to understand the technical detail that underpinned all of this. But more generally, he was embarking on a quite radical reshaping of agricultural support and the post-CAP regime. UKICE: But this was a government that made very clear that it was willing to contemplate no deal, to get out by 31 October. NFU President Minette Batters UK egg production has fallen to its lowest level in nine years. That takes me back to the point where I said that trade policy is so complex, its dull as ditch water, and so many people, politically, had not got to grips with the massive challenge, particularly the issues we would see on the island of Ireland. We focused all our lobbying on, I guess, the outcomes that we wanted to see achieved, not our means of getting there by some of the existing avenues; the Single Market, customs union, EFTA. By India Bourke 2001 The CWA Gold Dagger Award (shortlist): 2006 Quick Reads Learners' Favourite award: 2007 Coventry Inspiration Book Award: This page was last edited on 5 April 2023, at 20:13. Did you target any of the backbenchers who were holding out? I guess we always felt, in those early days, that a good Brexit effectively made agriculture the poster child of post-Brexit Britain. On gene editing, yes, on plant breeding, its a massive opportunity. Our focus was always based on what agriculture needed. I think, again, we need to be looking at producing more here. To our minds, this had been a democratic decision of the nation. Minette describes herself as an exploratory writer who never uses a plot scheme, begins with simple premises, has no idea whodunit until halfway through a story, but who remains excited about each novel because she, along with her reader, wants to know what happens next. Or did you, at that stage, think, This is so catastrophic, its just not going to happen? Worst of all, you didnt know whether you had a market. Her father died from kidney failure in 1960. Were talking about England only- are we going to have more complexity within the internal market? In fact, the solid line from the NFU had been that we wanted to maintain our high standards of animal welfare. Her third historical novel, The Swift and the Harrier, was published in 2021. Matthew Parris asks Minette about the challenges of balancing her work with the day-to-day demands of farming and what impact Lord Plumb made on British life. It took two and a half years to write and was rejected by numerous publishing houses until Macmillan Publishers, bought it for 1250. Youve got all the challenges with Stranraer and other places about access points. Top $76,000-a-year New Jersey boarding school admits 'more should have been done' to stop bullying of boy, 17, who took his own life after being falsely accused of rape by cruel peers We brought a massive coalition together of all farming organisations, nearly every NGO that is out there animal welfare experts, consumer groups, Jamie Oliver, Raymond Blanc, Prue Leith. What we wanted to do primarily was to open doors, doors that were shut due to some seeing agriculture as a problem. I know where that negotiating team are, so, either one side or the other side has to capitulate between now and June. UKICE: Do you think the Department for International Trade and Defra now have a unified view, or is this battle still being played out within government, as opposed to outside government? So a no deal meant that we would be dealing with the EU the same way as we would be dealing with the rest of the world in the absence of any trade deals. What we are seeing played out and its showing more with fish is that groupage is really difficult. I think the commitment was to get over 80% of the trade done in the term of this Parliament. She said: "Back in 2009, my friend Minette Batters and I saw that positive messages about Red Tractor-assured British beef were not getting through to the consumer. Because whatever we allow Australia to do, dont forget weve then got New Zealand, weve got Canada, and of course, overlaying all of that, weve got the Trans-Pacific deals. Those principles would guide the discussion. So, Liam Fox was obviously very engaged at that time as Secretary of State at DIT on the opportunities of global trade. So, we had a very good discussion at NFU Council in April 2016. I have to say, at that time, that was so needed, because we had to work through a process. So, the CAP was a multi-annual budget that sat outside of parliamentary cycles, so you got the budget, which I think annoyed others, in the NHS and education why did agriculture have special treatment? UKICE: Did you get a sense that government actually appreciated the lengths of those lead times in farming? What we wanted for this country should be, and still should be and must be, about what we want from other countries too. I suppose you can say that, in the end, the voice was heard, even if it took three botched attempts to avoid it. And why did you decide on your ultimate tactic, as we headed towards the referendum? Weve got the climate here to be growing it. Agriculture is up for this global climate challenge. Minette Batters became the first woman to hold the top job at the organisation, which represents more than 50,000 farmers in England and Wales. What are my members going to be doing in future? In her role as I think its essential that we can meet with him, bearing in mind weve still got active engagement with member states trying to resolve these issues. I would pose the question what does that mean for government buying standards? I just wondered whether that perception of the farming sector is right, or if it was much more evenly split than that? We were hearing the mantra of its going to be great because its going to be cheaper. Were still developing the thinking, still influencing, and with the academics and the science community working with us, we are making huge progress. +(91)-9821210096 | paula deen meatloaf with brown gravy. Possibly. So, he was very prepared to roll up his sleeves. And then, of course, just this wall of silence. Again, it was the engagement with Number 10 that got the global seasonal scheme of 30,000 over the line. Despite its majority force to put the Trade and Agricultural Commission on a statutory basis and other things like that, does the Government recognise it doesnt necessarily have a parliamentary majority for its vision of future trade in agricultural products? Her novels are often set against real backgrounds and real events to draw her readers into the reality of what she is writing about. So, I went to bed, went to sleep, woke up the following morning, and it was one of those situations Ive never done it before, Ill probably never do it again whereby you did not believe the television. These have been continuous weekly dialogue groups, with officials and ministers. MB: No, we immediately got our thinking together. The end of this will be judged in the years to come. UKICE: You dont represent farmers in Northern Ireland, because theyre represented by the Ulster Farmers Union. minette batters @Minette_Batters Wiltshire farmer: beef, sheep and arable. So, there were, along this journey, some slightly heart-stopping moments, as to the road that we were on. Contact: Agent | Publisher | General inquiries. Or did you wait to see what on earth the Government did, to fill in this void? But do bear in mind that a precedent had already been set. We are really asking Defra to keep looking at the impact assessments. UKICE: Theresa May was absolutely clear that Brexit meant ending free movement, but farming and food processing had been very dependent on Eastern European migration for a long time. So, I think everybody no matter what they say now was in total shock at what had happened. She supplemented her salary by writing romantic novelettes, short stories, and serials in her spare time. Youve got Liz Truss leading on trade with the rest of the world. In competition with works by other best-selling authors, such as Ruth Rendell, Maeve Binchy and Joanna Trollope, Chickenfeed has won two awards as the best novella in the Quick Reads genre. MB: We made continual calls, between Nick von Westenholz, myself and the other office-holders, with backbench MPs, talking about how dire a no deal would be. Weve obviously got a lot of trucks coming over and a lot of trucks going back empty. Release Calendar Top 250 Movies Most It was ideology based on three principles: A bonfire of regulation, the easiest trade deal in history, and more money for UK priorities, because we wouldnt be paying it into the EU. Weve now got the two licences in place for that. Set in the 14th century at the time of the bubonic plague, The Last Hours took several years to research and write. I think, on an official level on both sides, they could see the enormous challenge, but the decision that that had to be resolved was purely political. And at the moment, what we are finding is that there are so many moving parts to the level of engagement with different trading partners. Michael Gove was perhaps not in his most ideal Cabinet seat, but I think he did manage to rebrand himself with what had been deemed to be a graveyard department, to the benefit of the department. How were you involved in no deal preparations? Do not just go to government with X, Y and Z as a problem. Will either one? UKICE: Were you at all worried that he seemed to be establishing a rather surprisingly good relationship with the green lobby, who I think probably had a similar, oh my God, moment when he was appointed. But I was well aware that wed burnt quite a lot of bridges with people, who felt that the NFU had behaved badly. That isnt going to happen overnight, because weve actively pushed people away from doing those jobs. I think the EU member states were always going to be deeply suspicious of us lowering food standards. And a support aid budget of 3bn, a lot of talk is made about that. You know, weve got a government that now is saying its banning live animal exports, and it wants to have higher standards across the board of food production. The romantic novelettes were written in approximately two weeks and published under a pseudonym that remains a secret. And what I learnt quite early on, and has subsequently become a key element of NFU work, was that if you have a problem, work up the solution. The mixed farming business includes a 100-cow continental cross suckler herd, as well as sheep and arable. Do you think the Government has yet worked out beyond some of the things youve been worried about like the ban on live animal exports the opportunities of post-Brexit Britain, on regulating differently, more smartly, being more pro-innovation? He had said, on behalf of the NFU, that it was in farmings best interests to join the Common Market. Defra has obviously got form on implementation challenges, after trying to roll out what, on the face of it, was an easier payment scheme in the mid-2000s. We knew it would be a lose-lose to try and lobby, effectively, for a race to the bottom. I can remember challenging him at our February 2019 annual conference. It would help if we could speak to those who are leading these discussions. [6], In 2019 Walters was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of Dorset. What we want is four countries that are doing, effectively, the same thing, otherwise we will distort our own internal market. Were such a big organisation, representing 50,000 farmers across England and Wales. UKICE: In terms of getting ready, we had the negotiations going on, but there was a need to prepare for a rather uncertain change of regime at the end of 2020, when the transition ended. And this, I think, still remains a very complex political issue. Now with correct twitter handle! Dont forget, Michael Gove did not hold back in this arena, he is well documented and publicised. Ms Then there was the permanent focus, bearing in mind that successive governments have driven people out of doing what are deemed not to be office-based jobs, I suppose. But weve got to be able to do it in a way that has the right policies in place to deliver whats needed. airline pilot retirement age 70; what happened to mark reilly strong island; east carolina dean's list spring 2021; the frequency table shows the distribution of 1,200 students; lessons on stealing for students; At the moment, I feel weve got a lot of warm words, and we just need to know the nuts and bolts of what the genuine ambition is for this country. If we dont do that, we will see things rotting in the fields, simply because we havent got the capability to pick them. We use cookies to enhance your user experience. I sat back down next to him and I said, What do you think? And he looked at me, slightly surprised, and he said, I think youre very brave. That is still ongoing, and we still dont know what the future of checks is going to look like. We have commissioned some independent research to look at the viability of the new schemes, of how much will be lost, effectively, from BPS, and how much can be made up through either the agri-environment schemes or through the sustainable farming incentive. The catastrophic part came from the fact that, with more than 70% of our exports going into the EU, we would face their very high tariff wall which, for agricultural products like beef and lamb and dairy, was an impossible economic ladder to climb and at the same time, as a nation we import more than 30% of the food we consume from the EU. Of course, getting your voice heard in all of this was quite a challenge, I think, for the goods sector. The series was won by the actress Sherrie Hewson, whose debut novel The Tannery was published in March 2009. Dont get me wrong, I think the NFU is really optimistic about the future, we really believe we can be leaders in climate-friendly food production. That is a breaking of the manifesto commitment. We then used the NFU Council, to identify the key issues, we brought together an options paper, and we looked at bringing together a whole host of task and finish groups. She said: "Back in 2009, my friend Minette Batters and I saw that positive messages about Red Tractor-assured British beef were not getting through to the Checking everything against the principles was pretty key, because if you are leading an organisation, which I wasnt then, Meurig Raymond was, it is really critical to have that solid evidence based foundation from which to operate, and from which to build our policy and lobbying position from. What we feel is that the dialogue must bring a pragmatic solution at some stage. BiographyThe events that shaped Minettes life and career, Photo galleryA peek inside Minettes personal photo album, Charitable workOrganizations and causes Minette supports, Interview with Anne CattrellMinette talks about her life, Minette Walters 2019. We knew that we could have a global scheme, that it didnt all have to be about Europe, but with a reliance in the seasonal workforce, of 80,000 seasonal workers, to pick and pack and plant our fruit, veg and flowers. So, it was never about an unfair approach and it was never about a protectionist approach. We had an extraordinary meeting of our council, which is our sovereign body, made up of two representatives, effectively, from every county across England and Wales. Minette Batters on her farm near Downton. It was a formidable coalition. Minette was the first crime/thriller writer to win three major prizes with her first three books. MB: Well, it was well known, my constant mantra on no deal being catastrophic for farmers. Minette met her husband Alec Walters while she was at Durham and they married in 1978. So, a no deal and I will stand by it forever and a day would have been absolutely disastrous for British agriculture. Five generations of her family have run the farm but, like the new NFU president, she is the first woman to take the reins. Weve always maintained that, in the UK, we dont want to lower standards, but there has always been a concern as to what imports and the future of international trade will look like. If government is going to introduce legislation on higher welfare, it needs to effectively put its money where its mouth is, and make sure that our procurement is only sourcing at those standards. She runs the farm largely on her own, and her husband works in another industry. In 2017, Minette realised a long-held ambition to publish an historical novel. So, the need for the NFU to get this right, to not drop a ball, to be focused on what is needed, to be the lobbyist extraordinaire ultimately, the weight of that falling on my shoulders has felt like a massive responsibility.
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