Reason For The Study
So, the disgraceful anti-British government of Kier 'two-tier'/ 'free-gear'/ 'flip-flop'/ 'sausage' appears to have declared war on the farming community. For those of us outside the London 'bubble' who follow politics, this has come as no surprise: after all, most farmers are rural (not urban) in outlook, based in rural (conservative-inclined) constituencies, dislike political intervention, and epitomise traditional British cultural values. Is it any wonder that farmers are so disliked by the Labour 'intelligentsia' in this far-left, globalist, 'comintern' administration? However, in order to set the record straight, it was felt that an in-depth study should be undertaken of the farming sector, studied from the point of view of those directly involved.
Background
There are approximately 200,000 farms left in the UK, and of these the National Farmers Union suggests that the inheritance tax introduced by 'Rachel From Accounts', would affect around 70,000 (Bradley, 2024). However, this will not be problematic as according to Steve Reed, Labour Environment Secretary and MP for that deep rural constituency of Streatham & Croydon North, the inheritance tax on farms will be "…good for farming and food production" (Bradley, 2024). Obviously, someone with an urban background has a much broader and deeper understanding of rural affairs than does a simple farmer, who may well have lived all his life in the countryside, and is consequently ignorant of more important issues than mere farming and food security – issues such as pay rises for public sector workers and the government's union paymasters - totalling around £9 bn (Guyoncourt, 2024). In addition to this there is the crucial issue of reducing the amount of money wasted on providing Winter Fuel Allowance (WFA) to pensioners who persist in trying to live through the bitterly cold winters: the withdrawal of the WFA was necessary in order to re-direct the money to cover the modest heating claims of MPs: most Labour MPs have shown their understanding of and support for the policy by voting to scrap the WFA, whilst at the same time continuing to gratefully receive subsidies for their energy costs (Toth, 2024). There are other issues that are crucial to the well-being of the nation – such as the low level of accommodation and other benefits that illegal immigrants receive, the amount of taxpayer's money to be sent abroad to prop up dubious dictatorships in Africa, and many other issues that mere farmers cannot possibly be expected to understand.
Methodology:
We decided to investigate the farming situation and as the current government appears to be banning free speech by human beings, it was decided to turn to the animals themselves to see whether they had a better understanding of the wider issues behind the imposition of the inheritance tax. The idea of interviewing farm animals about socio-politico-economic issues is a methodology first pioneered by George Orwell, in his study of animal psychology and attitudes to authority and control, and published in 1945 under the title Animal Farm. Other similar studies include C.S. Lewis's famous series of unstructured in-depth interviews with animals forced to live in slum accommodation by their evil owners: despite initial opposition from a number of pressure groups, this was eventually published in 1950 under the title The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.
Whilst accepting the risk of being labelled 'anti-vegetarian', and despite evidence on the verbosity of cabbages and the verbal qualities of carrots, it was decided that interviews would only be conducted with livestock. From the list of exclusively livestock farms, we identified three that appeared to equate with the average level of wealth of UK farms as perceived by the current Labour government: ie. the land was worth £300 million, the livestock around £120 million, the farm buildings around £1.6 million, and the farm equipment around £3.5 million.
Questionnaires were sent to all farms: "Ewe Turn" (sheep farm near Buxton, Derbyshire); "Hen-pecked" (poultry, Henbury-Cheshire), and "Moosic-to-my ears" (cattle, Milking Lane, Darwen, Lancashire) as they seemed to be most representative of their sectors. Once we had agreed a date and time with the farmer, we then prepared for the in-depth interviews. All interviews (which were anonymised to protect the identity of respondents) took place between 09:00 and 18:00 as we had to avoid milking time, and evenings – the chickens were shut up before dark due to the increase in foxes – as an aside, to a bird, they blamed 'Phoney Blur' for his ban on fox hunting as being directly responsible: they felt that he 'couldn't give a cluck' about them. Due to restrictions on space and word limit, we only report on the interviews from "Ewe Turn."
Findings and Discussion
We interviewed three sheep, chosen at random and they all agreed that 'fixing the foundations' was an essential priority in view of the 14 centuries of Tory mis-rule, and an unexpected £200 trillion 'black hole' in the finances. Daisy (left) also blamed the 'evil Tories' for the lack of winter feed, especially since the withdrawal of the 'Winter Fodder Allowance'. Buttercup (middle) pointed out that it was in fact the new 'Sausage' administration that had scrapped this allowance, in the hope that many potential Ovis voters would freeze to death before the next General Election and would not be able to vote Tory.
Dolly (right) said that as she was more concerned that 'Rachel From Accounts' had lied on her CV, and wondered whether she was up to the job, especially as she appeared not to understand the importance of farming to the UK national security. Daisy, who had studied history at Warwick University, pointed out that: "…historically there has always been a net influx of food products into the UK, a dangerous situation to be in as the country would have been brought to its knees during WWII had we not been able to continue these imports, and that this had led to what was the longest battle of WWII – the Battle of the Atlantic – to keep open the supply lines. It took many years, and battles with the EU, for governments to acknowledge the strategic importance of farming to the well-being and prosperity of the nation. Consequently, far from being persecuted, the farming community should be held in esteem in view of their contribution to the defence and well-being of the nation." Dolly and Buttercup both agreed, and resumed eating grass.
Buttercup paused for a moment to add that "…in view of this government's urban outlook, lack of business experience, extreme left-wing philosophy, anti-independence and anti-British agenda, it had come as no surprise that 'Sir Sausage' has decided that farmers were less important to the strategic well-being of the country than train drivers, or any other of his Union paymasters." She added that she did not believe that 'Rachel From Accounts had actually thought through the mess that she is making.' She said that her 'Great Aunt Wooley could recall relatively recently, when Liz Truss was PM, she was accused of having 'crashed' the economy.' (At this point the others nodded in agreement). Buttercup continued with her analysis, pointing out that: "Rachel from Accounts has managed in the space of less than three months to do the same." At that point, Myxomatosis the farm rabbit, interrupted saying that: "…at least the Conservatives could legitimately argue that an economic recession on their watch was a consequence of Covid 19 and the economic impact it had on all sectors of the economy." (He was told to 'shut up' as no-one was interested in his hare-brained opinions). Dolly said that more recently, she could remember when Sir Sausage (then Leader of HM Opposition), had said that he wanted to build a new Britain, and that were he to be elected he would seize the moment and "…go forward to a future that's going to look utterly unlike the past…" (she quoted McGuiness, 2021). As she noted with a sly bleat, so far this appears to be the one area in which he has not lied to the British public, as he has caused division within society, financially attacked pensioners, tried to ban freedom of speech, allowed convicted criminals to leave jail early, allowed an unknown number of foreign criminals and law-breakers into the country un-registered, and refused to hold public enquiries over criminal activities in towns around Manchester.' She nodded slowly: "Yes …the country is already very different."
Linked to the question of competence of Rachel From Accounts, was her apparent inability to understand that the demonstrations in the heart of London show just how much her policies based on the 'sausage agenda' are resented by the farming community. For example, even those policies not specifically designed to harm farmers would in fact harm them: such as 'the increase in employer NI contributions.' Dolly said that she had heard that Farmer Giles could not afford to pay this, and that he would have to let 'Ben' the border collie go. There was a bit of an argument, as Buttercup said that she 'would not miss him', and that he could be easily replaced by an illegal immigrant – who would demand much less in wages. Buttercup said that she had heard that the next door farm might have to be sold to a large American Corporation: (at this point there were jokes about 'Old MacDonald had a farm'). On the subject of illegal immigration, Daisy wondered why so many people wanted to come to the UK as there was "…nothing to do but stand around in the rain and eat grass." Dolly explained that it was because of the "…free taxi service from the middle of the English Channel, the free accommodation, pocket money, education, preferential vet care, and the mobile 'phones that humans were given." All three respondents could not understand why homeless British people were forced to sleep on the streets, whilst those who had broken the law and entered the country illegally, were given preferential treatment.
There was a general consensus that the sausage administration had let everyone down, and despite any bleatings to the contrary, would probably sell out UK interests in the Falkland Islands – just as they had done in the Chagos Islands; as Daisy said, the man who 'deals with foreigners' (they thought he was called Mr. Lamb) would be held responsible if he were to give away any of the country's overseas interests, even if he were unsure as to where in the world they were. The idea that Lamby should decide the fate of the thousands of sheep in The Falkland Islands incensed all respondents, as all had family there, and Great Uncle Tup was the Chairman of the Falklands Ovine Appreciation Society. Farmer Giles also had family there, and Buttercup had overheard him discussing with his wife what would happen if the Islands were given to someone called 'Argy'. Finally, all three respondents blamed global warming for late arrival of Santa, and the poor quality of grass.
Recommendations
All three agreed that, in view of the disgraceful way in which this government is treating our farmers, there should be a far more effective way of getting the message through to Sir Sausage that he is endangering our food supply. Dolly suggested two ways in which the government could be brought to its senses:
(1) All farmers who currently supply directly to the House of Commons canteen, the House of Lords canteen, and the canteens and shops of all government departments, should stop immediately. If they could get no supplies, they would very soon realise the importance of farming to the UK food supply. In addition, those farmers who ceased to trade directly with Government venues would sell less, and would therefore, be able to reduce their tax bill – ('serve Rachel From Accounts' right was the general consensus.)
(2) The second part of Dolly's plan was that any supermarket or retail outlet dealing with food (such as Sainsbury's, Tesco, M&S etc.) that currently has a contract with any of the above government-linked places, should immediately treble (or even quadruple) the prices they charge to such establishments, and donate the excess profit to those farmers who might have lost their markets as a consequence of 1 (above). The contributions farmers receive from these retail outlets would be classified as 'gifts', and according to Oswald Owl (a real accountant who sub-lets an office in the big barn), they should not be subject to income tax. (There was another chorus of 'serve Rachel From Accounts' right').
All respondents agreed that, at a stroke, the farmers would have got their message across without hurting the general public. The retailers could portray themselves as the friends of both farmer and consumer - who knows, a new relationship might even develop? Buttercup added that she was, however, still in favour of protectionism, especially from New Zealand.
At this point, Diem the carp from the duck pond surfaced, and admitted to having listened in on the interviews, and suggested that a similar policy could be applied by the fishing industry, as he had heard that Sir Sausage was going to let foreign boats come and fish in UK waters. The interview concluded with an exchange of insults between Diem, Oswald and the three sheep.
References
Bradley, Charlie (2024) "Fury as clueless Labour MP says inheritance tax raid will be 'good for UK farmers" Express (28 November); https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1981795/labour-inheritance-tax-farmers-steve-reed
Guyoncourt, Sally (2024) "All the public sector pay deals and how much they've cost so far." The i Paper (16 August); https://inews.co.uk/news/public-sector-pay-deals-cost
Alan McGuinness, Alan (2021) "COVID-19: 'We can't return to business as usual,' says Sir Keir Starmer as he sets out post-coronavirus vision." SKY News (18 February)
Toth, Albert (2024) "Labour MPs expensed over £400,000 for energy bills before axing winter fuelpayments" Independent (11 September); https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-mp-winter-fuel-payment-energy-bills-expenses.