Baroness Natalie Bennett, Green Party member of the House of Lords, has been in Suffolk in support of the Mid Suffolk Green Party campaign for next year's local elections. During the day she met members and councillors with a particular interest in agriculture and wildlife.
The key focus for discussion was the future of the Environmental Land Management Schemes (ELMS), which the pre-Truss Government had been developing as a more wildlife-friendly replacement for the Common Agricultural Policy support system.
Natalie discussed ELMS with Glenn Buckingham, leading Suffolk farmer and former county NFU chair, who said:
"The new Government's approach is exceptionally worrying. To have a review of ELMS when it was all leading in the right direction is bonkers."
Natalie expressed her fears:
“The nation's attention is focused now on the Tories’ own goal of economic and financial chaos, but for farmers the total uncertainty about the continuation or direction of ELMS is even more urgent, and for many farmers a life or death issue for their businesses.
The financial sector might be able to shift money around at lightning speed, but breeding a cow to sell a calf takes two to three years, trees take decades to grow, soils many years to recover from chemicalised industrial agriculture and crops many months to yield. Not knowing what the Government's policies are from day to day puts our food security, our natural world and ability to meet our legally binding climate targets in even greater danger."
Natalie also spent time canvassing with other members in the Stonhams ward of Mid Suffolk. In the evening she officially launched the local party's campaign to win control of the District Council next May.
