Farm Assurance was supported to give the consumer confidence that the food they buy is reared to the highest standards and to give the farmer a premium on produce to compensate for the high standards and increased costs.

RED TRACTOR is probably the best known of the Assurance Schemes. The sight of a Red Tractor on your joint of lamb was supposed to be a sign that it was reared in the UK to the highest welfare standards BUT…. a check of the small print on your joint (proudly bearing the Red Tractor logo) is likely to reveal that your lamb was produced in New Zealand and your beef and chicken in Poland.

Of course, the Supermarkets don’t care – high welfare costs money and they do not want to pay the UK farmer the going rate – so they buy in food stuffs (which may be fine to eat) over which they have no assurance of the Welfare Standards. And that premium that the Farmers were promised – well that evaporated pretty quickly as well.

The consumer is being duped and the UK Farmers are being pushed to the edge of bankruptcy.

Pat Bryant

UK Independence Party Spokesman for Food and Rural Affairs