EU Referendum

It is not often that this blog pays too much attention to the NFU (known in the business as No F***ing Use) but this delightful little item has caught my attention.

The NFU eschews pronouncements by people who might know something such as Van Jolissaint of DaimlerChrysler, who, as my colleague points out, did not say any of the things that were attributed to him, or Michael O'Leary of Ryanair, who most certainly did say all the things he is supposed to have said about the unknown minister of aviation.

The NFU, as ever, supports the European Commission, in the vain hope that next time round, the Union’s members might benefit from something that comes out of the European Union.

In particular, it supports the “package of proposals on energy and climate change published” yesterday. Well, supports it up to a point. For it does not go far enough.

However, while the NFU welcomes what is an ambitious programme, we are disappointed that it has taken the form of a white paper rather than draft legal texts. The Commission will be seeking endorsement from the spring EU Council meeting and will come forwards with draft legislation beyond that. We share the Commission’s view that “concrete action is required urgently”.

Well, I wouldn’t be too despondent if I were the NFU. Given that there is evidence for the climate-changing propensities of cows when they perform certain bodily functions, given that the NFU persisted in supporting DEFRA's insane policy of slaughtering millions of healthy animals rather than vaccinating them during the foot and mouth epidemic, one could argue that the bods at Stoneleigh have already carried out very concrete actions in the cause of climate change.

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