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Informative article about EU workers who are a vital part of the UK food industry. Makes the obvious point that these workers are not "stealing our jobs" but are doing work that British people don't want to do.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/may/21/brexit-coming-food-crisis-seasonal-migrant-labour-eu#img-1

Let's hope the skewed "free EU market" which means that dairy and cheese production can be completely shut down or regularly threatened with complete shut down on Scottish Islands like Bute, Arran and Islay will end with Brexit. Perhaps then it will no longer be cheaper to drive and ship milk and cheddar into England, Wales and Scotland from Poland and other far-flung EU countries. Simply sharpening the end of the pointy stick used to drive the "free EU market" cannot be the way forward for jobs in farming and agriculture of the UK - either for consumers, employees or livestock.

http://www.buteman.co.uk/news/rothesay-creamery-set-to-cease-production-1-369394

http://www.arranbanner.co.uk/tag/kilmory


This Grauniad article presents a good overview of what has happened to the UK Dairy Industry under EU and Supermarket/ FirstMilk stewardship over the last 20 years. This is worth a read. The raw milk story of Mr Hook is very compelling for those who think that Brexit and an escape from "free EU market" regulation means a loss of jobs.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/oct/02/-sp-battle-soul-british-milk

The way ahead just might NOT be indoor dairy herds of 5,000 kept in huge sheds all their lives so that EU lovers can enjoy milk a penny cheaper each year from cows that (each) have an average of 11,500 litres of milk squeezed out of them in a year in the shed. That kind of "free EU market" vision of farming and agriculture is only heading one way. Ooops! Oh yeah... that kind of "free EU market" has already reached its destination in the UK.

I can drive for twenty miles in fields of pasture round these parts and not see a single dairy herd. Grim.

As part of my day job I talk to a lot of farmers who are terrified about leaving the EU as the removal of EU subsidies will mean a lot of them will go out of business

That's a very good read on a Sunday morning.

A long read but worth your time (the report, not the introduction):

http://www.jayrayner.co.uk/news/michael-gove-asked-me-to-a-meeting-to-share-my-expertise-i-declined-instead-ive-given-him-a-piece-of-my-mind/

Today's naysayers doom-mongering about the food industry, just in case anyone thought any of this was going away:

https://amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/05/brexit-uk-food-industry-eu-fruit-veg-pickers


"Who knows? We could turn the suddenly vacated fields into nostalgic theme parks, where people could watch re-enactments of the second world war while eating imported strawberries: it would be the perfect Brexit day out, should anyone be able to afford it."