Latest reports suggest that the pre-emptive, 'firewall' massacre in Cumbria has ostensibly failed; the disease is spreading to the nearby Peak district. Nick Brown, leader of the MAFF[IA] has now told farmers not to use such legitimate appeal procedeures as exist against this illegal slaughter.
Meanwhile, the NAVY has now been called in to bury the mounds of rotting carcasses, to which it is rumoured, family pets are being added.
The opposition to the cull in Wales continues. Across the country as a whole, the dispute looks indeed like a war; farmers have been arrested for barricading thier lands, police vehicles have been crushed and a MAFF slaughterer has been shot dead in Cumbria. [see web link]
Recalcitrant farmers have been dragged before the TV cameras to state their newfound 'support' for the senseless plans. One heartbroken man lamentably described the killing of his pedigree herd as being an opportunity and a challenge. Not for the sheep, we may sardonically add, but herein lies the clue to what is going on: Blair wants to MODERNIZE THE COUNTRYSIDE, to commercialise it, open it up for the emerging NEO-CAPITALISM. He wants to crush the agricultural community in precisely the same way as the trades unionists and urban dwellers have been, and continue to be, atomised and dissolved. We in the towns who have suffered from Thatcher/Blair (same person after all!) must not sit passively while the same happens to others. Farmers up to now have been 'loyal', but they now see where blind loyalty leads ! The Farmers Union, the NFU, has been co-opted into Blair's plans, so however unsatisfactory, that leaves Handley's Farmers For Action as the chief representative of the agricultural militants. We should try to persuade them of the left wing alternative.