Broadcasts live every Wednesday at 7:00p.m. uk time on Radio Soapbox: http://radiosoapbox.com
Welcome to another engaging episode of the Shelley Tasker Show, where we delve into pressing issues affecting our local communities and beyond. This week, we are joined by Farmer Pete, a prominent figure in the local farmers' movement, to discuss the recent changes in inheritance tax proposed by the Labour government and its devastating impact on small farms. Farmer Pete explains how these changes could lead to significant financial burdens, forcing many farmers to sell land and potentially leading to the loss of farms.
We explore the broader implications of these policies, including the perceived agenda against farmers and the push towards alternative food production methods like lab-grown meat and vertical farming. The conversation touches on the challenges of transitioning to electric vehicles in agriculture and the potential removal of benefits like red diesel for farmers.
Farmer Pete shares insights into the struggles of British farmers, the impact of global trade policies, and the need for protectionism to safeguard local agriculture. We also discuss the importance of supporting local food systems and the potential for direct-to-retail movements to break the supermarket monopoly.
In a broader context, we address the controversial topic of geoengineering and its potential impact on farming, as well as the challenges posed by the green agenda and solar farms on agricultural land. Farmer Pete emphasizes the need for public awareness and action to support the farming community and protect food security.
Join us as we rally support for the upcoming protest in Truro, advocating for farmers' rights and sustainable agricultural practices. This episode is a call to action for listeners to engage with these critical issues and support their local farmers.
[00:00:56]
Unknown:
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Shelley Tasker Show coming live out of radiosoakbox.com. It's good to have your company. Today's date is Wednesday, 13th November 2024. Happy hump day, everybody. I'm also streaming live on Rumble. So if you've got any questions, comments, please do so, and please feel free to give it a like and a subscribe. So great guests lined up this evening. This man is is a powerful figure in our local farmers movement, stood for local independent candidate a while ago, and he's still keeping on with the fight. Farmer Pete, good evening, and welcome to the show.
[00:01:34] Unknown:
Good evening, Shelley. Thank you for having me on the show again. No. You're welcome. Always lovely to have a catch up.
[00:01:40] Unknown:
And, got a busy sort of time ahead of you. We've, well, we've got a big rally coming up on Tuesday. I know it's more of a national one, but the following Saturday, you're, running a local rally in Truro, and it's all kicking off.
[00:01:58] Unknown:
Well, I mean, the inheritance tax attack, as I call it, in the recent budget has been the straw that's broken the camel's back for many people.
[00:02:11] Unknown:
It was bad enough before that, wasn't it? But now this is, like, one of the massive thing. Can you explain to the the listeners, necessarily in this country, what is going on with your whole inheritance tax?
[00:02:25] Unknown:
Well, there's been a proposal in the recent autumn budget by the current Labour government to effectively downgrade the amount of relief for this particular tax that farmers can claim. Previously, there was no liability for passing, an estate onto your son and daughter provided that the parent stayed alive for 7 years post gifting. That's now changed to various thresholds being put in whereby, effectively, a 50% rate of tax will have to be paid after a certain value. So although this equates to properties over the value of about £3,000,000, it's still very serious for farms because it it doesn't take a lot of land these days with land priced at 10 or £15,000 an acre for you to be quite cash poor as a farming business, but sitting on, you know, a valuable asset worth 3, 4, £5,000,000 quite easily. These are small farms.
And should you unfortunately pass away after gifting your family to your, to your children within the 7 year rule, then they, your your surviving descendants will be liable to, an effective rate of inheritance tax of 20% on the value of the estate. So this could very quickly mount up to tax bills of several £100,000. And that is a devastating blow for, well, any farm, let alone the small farms. And it will, of course, mean for a majority of them that the only way they can pay this bill is to sell land. That, of course, will downgrade the size of their business and affect their ability to, to make a profit and be viable as a business anyway. So it's gonna start a vicious downward cycle and, will result in the loss of lots of farms.
And, despite the claims made by the government that it was this will hardly affect any any farms, you know, 2 200 farms or so per year, I believe that's nonsense. It's going to affect a lot of farms. And this is very, very serious. And it comes at the end of a a war of attrition that's gone on with British farming as it has done with farming in Europe and much of the developed world. There seems to be an agenda to attack the farmers and somehow run them down to the point where they're not viable as businesses and somehow get access to the land. So, it's it's we have it's it's been an awful time. It's been a big shock.
Some people expected it to happen. Among those was myself. I thought this was coming. It's an absolute disaster, but we have to see something good come of it. It's getting people out, and we need to capitalize on the, feeling that's out there at the moment and, make sure we build our movement, and take full advantage of the situation.
[00:05:58] Unknown:
What an awful time for farmers. I mean, if things weren't bad enough and it's like you say, it's almost like they're literally just trying to out with the farmers. And if this comes into, like, agenda 21 30, you know, we know that they don't want us eating meat and things like that. But surely, we need the farmers even for the fruit and vegetables, for the plant based diet that we're going to eat.
[00:06:22] Unknown:
Well, if you look at the Sainsbury's future of food report, apparently not. It will all be generated in indoor vertical farms and be the creation of, the novel protein industry and lab meat and things like that. But, yes, it's, you know, there's there's no doubt. This is a a coordinated plan, and it goes back a long way. And it's clearly coming from the United Nations from the 17 sustainable development goals. In particular, number 13, climate action. This is where all the 2030 agenda and all the directives come, down through the World Economic Forum to government level and our faithful political establishment, as you know, like to just jet off there and receive their instructions for the coming year as to the, latest iteration of the plan. And that's why we get what we're getting, 15 minute cities, a war on car use,
[00:07:26] Unknown:
you know, and and we're hearing proposals about, you know, having to eat less meat and, you know, all the rest of it. So, yeah, it's a coordinated plan. Do they not ever bring in, like, the whole side, you know, or they want us on electric cars? Are they not bringing in, like, electric tractors for you guys?
[00:07:42] Unknown:
Yeah. The the battery storage technology just is not there. You know? It it just costs too much. I mean, you know, I know Tesla have got semi trucks coming out. But, you know, it it it's cost. Battery storage is just hugely expensive. We know that from costing out, when people make claims of wind farms and things like that. That, you know, we we can have battery storage to fill in those intermittent times where we have wind droughts and things like that. But the cost of it are absolutely enormous. You know, off the scale, not not, you know, ridiculous. So the battery storage isn't there. Even if it's technically possible to power a tractor with a battery, the cost will be prohibitive.
And, and the whole thing's based on nonsense, of course, anyway. You know, I mean, emissions aren't a problem in the countryside. The only reason that you would put an argument forward for electric cars in dense urban areas is on a quality of air issue. And and on that that issue, they do a good job, so they can be justified on that. But there's certainly no justification for electric cars on any, of the so called climate alarmism claims relating to, carbon dioxide being, you know, the gas of debt, should we say. It is, in fact, the gas of life, as I'm sure you're you're well aware. But,
[00:09:13] Unknown:
yeah. And do you think that Rachel Reeves, is she gonna take away the benefit to farmers using red diesel?
[00:09:19] Unknown:
Yes. Well, I mean, everybody's concentrated on the inheritance tax issue, but, of course, there there was 2 or 3 other things in the budget, and that was one of them. She's guaranteed it for another year, but that's it. So, who knows after that? My bet to be on, she's gonna remove it in the following year. So that's gonna be another hit to us. There was a hit on the classification of 4 by fours and pickup trucks whereby they're now classified as cars. And therefore, they come under a, a more strict tax regime. And they can't be offset as a capital asset. The the purchase can't be offset a 100% in the 1st year of purchase.
They can only be deducted at 6% a year. So, you know, this is just gonna end end up with you paying more tax. Of course, there was a big hit on hospitality industry. And, you know, I know that's just kind of offshoot of farming, but it's all related. The food sector is is our biggest manufacturing sector. And, you know, pubs, hotels, restaurants, they're all getting hit with much higher. I mean, they've they've doubled business rates for the hospitality sector. And along with employers, National Insurance has gone up. So despite their promise that they're not gonna tax the worker, they're taxing the bosses. So it's it's a disaster across the board. They've taxed everybody except the rich, which is really quite a thing to get your head around from a political party that calls themselves labor and is supposed to be the prime advocates for the working class. So,
[00:11:02] Unknown:
yeah, nothing good to to say of it, at all, Shelley. So it hasn't gone through then through the budget yet. Is it is it like a done deal or this is what the protest is about this coming Tuesday about the inheritance tax?
[00:11:17] Unknown:
Yes. They it is their proposals for the budget that will come in next April. Right. Okay. Okay. So, I I guess they're they're they will now just have to deal with the, you know, the political kickback from it as it happens. But, you know, they're in power. They've got the majority in parliament. So unless they sense, a kind of backbench rebellion or, you know, something of that nature that's actually gonna make them change course. No. This will be what it is, I'm afraid.
[00:11:54] Unknown:
And, ultimately, the way this is going, I mean, farming is just gonna be gone, isn't it? There there's no way in in this world that you guys can keep forking out. I mean, I'm surprised I'll say many of you, like, stay afloat now, literally.
[00:12:09] Unknown:
Well, it's really only been the fact that we've had advances in efficiency and technological development and in our methods of farming that keep returning gains as we're going along. Farming has been nothing but the history of starting with our bare hands and coming to the point that that that we are today with, advanced machinery, GPS, you know. And we're we're constantly returning efficiencies. If we think about the so called green revolution in the sixties seventies, this was the hybridizing of various types of wheat, which, had dwarfing genes. And these these genes were, found to deliver about 5 to 10% more yield from the wheat because it was lower to the ground. It was more sheltered, and it had put less energy into actually growing the actual stalk of the wheat and could put more into the actual grain, etcetera.
You know, the these constant iterations of progress are really the only thing that's been keeping our head above water because we've had no protectionism of any sort by a little point just after the second world war where we had, minimum prices and a deficiency payment scheme, under a labor government, funnily enough, introduced. It only lasted a couple of decades, but even so, that was something. But, really, going back to 1846 with the repeal of the corn laws, that was the last time we had any protectionism. And it's been open borders globalism ever since. And we've been left to, you know, left hung out to dry and fend for ourselves. It's been a, a kind of Darwinian experience, and and you can't help thinking that they're sort of, you know, watching it in some kind of hunger games, perverse enjoyment, seeing who's gonna make it and who's not. It's a disgrace, for a nation not to support their farmers.
So that's where we're at. The the the inheritance tax thing really is the end of a long long line of of dispute. And the the there's bad water and it runs very deep. It's deep. There's a lot of frustration down down and there's a lot of anger. And, we need to make sure that we deal with the coming protests in the right way for maximum effect. I mean, we've just gotta get these people out of power. But it's not just the Labour Party as you know. It's way bigger than that. This whole political establishment, the uni party collective, which unfortunately does include reform as good as they are on some things.
So we really need to get active now. People have just got to realize you've gotta put time, effort, and money into fighting this now. We can't sit back. We can't sit back now. They they have openly declared their agenda, to attack the farmers. And if they get their hands on the means of food production, then it does not bode well.
[00:15:09] Unknown:
And, I mean, the whole idea, I suppose, of the inheritance taxes so that they make more money in taxes because it's all about taxes, isn't it? Can you just, like, give a brief, like so if you sold your farm for a £1,000,000, how much of that would go to tax? Did you say 50%?
[00:15:27] Unknown:
Well, there's a £1,000,000 allowance per per person as I understand it. So a married couple would have a £1,000,000 allowance each. So that's 2,000,000. And then I believe there's a property relief as well, which the 2 the 2 parts of that combined come to 500,000 each as well. So as I understand it, it's a total of £3,000,000 worth of property. If your farm was worth 4,000,000 and you had to pay the tax, you would pay 20% on the £1,000,000 above the £3,000,000 threshold. So it's an effective rate of 20% anything above £3,000,000 as far as I understand it. So even at a £4,000,000 farm, that's a £200,000 tax bill. So It's a bloody hell, isn't it? Well Yes. Massive. And then if you think about yeah. If you think about the price of land, you know, just, a 300 acre farm, which is not a big farm at all by any means. I mean, just the land alone of between £10,000 or £15,000.
I mean, you're looking at 4,000,000 just in the value of land anyway, let alone the farmhouse, and we all know the price of property. So So what is the going rate at the moment for an acre of land in the UK? Well, farmland goes anywhere between £10,000 an acre to 15 on an agricultural sale in most parts of the country, certainly in the southwest that I'm aware of, and Central England. Perhaps it might be cheaper in Scotland. I don't know. But, of course, that's on large purchases the general public might want to buy perhaps for a paddock or something like that, then the the price goes up. And it's not uncommon to find even acres of land going for £50,000 in small parcels, because people want people want to have them as a sort of extension of their home environment. But generally speaking, 10 to 15,000 is the average for for farmland. So, you know, you're gonna get to 3 or £4,000,000
[00:17:37] Unknown:
in land alone on an average farm. So Yeah. Because I mean, I'm guessing all all your outgoings and stuff. I mean, fertilizer. There must be a small cost just in that alone.
[00:17:48] Unknown:
Well, yeah, farming's a a high intent a a high input business. You need to you need to front a lot of costs forward to the operation in order to grow the crop to make profit, hopefully. So
[00:18:01] Unknown:
And when people saw this might sound really a a little bit naive, but, like, if I was to go and buy a farm now, would I would I be expecting to buy all the machinery and everything that goes with it complete, or you just not?
[00:18:16] Unknown:
Not not usually. No. No. If if a farmer wants to retire or or perhaps passes away, and there's no succession, they'll normally be the machinery will normally be sold off. And then the land and building and and assets will be will be, will be put up for sale because another farmer coming in to buy it may not want to use the land, for the purposes that the previous farmer was was doing. So, yeah. It's not not doesn't usually come with the kit. Right. Okay. But, you know, talking about kit, you know, and and how expensive it is to farm, there's very little help for the actual purchasing of of the equipment. I mean, tractors are expensive now, you know.
An average 150 horsepower tractor is something like a £150,000. A decent combine harvester, £600,000. So, you know, most farms have a lot of money out as loans, and, you know, they're subject to the hikes in interest rates. And, this this is difficult for them when, when times are tough and the fry and the interest rates go up. So, you know, there needs to be a a low interest loan scheme for farmers. There's not enough support in the agricultural budget at all to provide for these kind of things. So, there there's a heap of stuff wrong. You know, the budget's way underfunded. There's no low interest loan scheme. There's no price protectionism against imports.
There's complaints of cheap wheat coming in now, and that can just pass straight through the ports, get rubber stamps. There's no accreditation schemes required for it, and it can go ahead of the queue to British milling firms. Whereas our wheat producers have to go through red tractor accreditation schemes and do all the paperwork and take on the extra cost for that for a British miller to take our flour. So, you know, it's the open borders issue is is on everything. It's on trade as well as the movement of people. So
[00:20:25] Unknown:
And how much food do we roughly have imported over here then?
[00:20:30] Unknown:
Well, the headline figure from DEFRA is that we import 46% of all the food we eat. So that's about half the food on your plate every year, is grown abroad. And that's shocking enough. But, I mean, some of that is stuff we can't grow here. Obviously, tropical fruit and things like that. But when you look at our indigenous crop, what I call indigenous crops, they're not really indigenous, but the crops that could be grown here in the British climate, when you look at production to annual consumption requirements of those crops, we've gone from 95% in the mid eighties to 73% today. So over 4 short decades, we've lost 23% of production. That's nearly 6% a decade in crops that we need, tonnage of crops that we need every year for consumption that we can grow here. So there's just absolutely need, no need for for that loss. That is complete outsourcing
[00:21:37] Unknown:
of British agricultural production, and that's really affecting our our self sufficient So are you saying that they're they're getting that abroad then rather than using the English farmers? Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. And is that because it's cheaper? Yep.
[00:21:52] Unknown:
It's because it's cheaper. So they're running British farmers down. More and more of them are going bust. I think we're down to 3 or 4 carrot growers in the east of the country now. So, you know, it's getting harder and harder for people to survive. The only way a grower can survive is to be a bigger fish in the pond. They have to wait for somebody else to pack up and then buy their business. So they become a bigger monopoly, and then they can operate a greater economy of scale. So it's driving everybody into this monopoly huge farming model.
And when we can't keep up with supply because there's just not enough of us doing it, then they they they just buy in from abroad. And, like I say, there's very little accreditation required. So these apart from the food miles issue, which runs completely contrary to the net zero religion, we've got food quality. They've got to, you know, there's gotta be harvested a long, you know, a long time before transport and, you know, the different standards, the environmental standards, and everything that comes with it. So and that's important with meats and things like that, especially, you know, when we're talking about food lock production where the animals might not even be on grass. They're just on on their earth being fed GMO feeds and routinely administered with growth hormones and antibiotics as, as just de rigueur treatments.
And, and there's no regulation about labeling that at all. So labeling is another really big issue, for the consumer. We need honest food labeling because all this kind of stuff is hidden. It's all just brushed under the carpet and the consumer is just continually barraged with this cheap food rhetoric. It's gotta be cheap. It's cheap, cheap, cheap. Get to the supermarket. Get it all cheap. And, you know, it's yeah. There's a lot there's a lot to unpick and a lot to do.
[00:23:48] Unknown:
Yeah. And I mean, our local in our town, we had one butcher, and at the end of this month, that butcher is closing down. So that's the last one in Cambourne town out of probably about 6 in total, you know, over the last 50 years or so. So, I mean, I've I source all of my meat from my local butchers, which is, like, in the village, 2 minute walk away from me. And I wouldn't dare now since I've gone down this whole farmer's movement thing and been finding out about food and stuff. I won't buy the meat. I mean, a couple of times I've been desperate and had to, but the bulk of it comes from the butchers because it's like like you say, labeling. How long does it take? Where did it come from? What was it packaged in? What's it been infused in to keep it fresh?
It's, it's frightening.
[00:24:35] Unknown:
That's right. I mean, we we do need as one of the solutions that hopefully will come out of this crisis is we really do need to kick start a direct to retail movement. We've got to break the monopoly and the centralization of the supermarkets. Now I know they're useful for things. Everybody uses them. You know, you you you're whipping past. You just need something. I know. They serve a purpose. But we really should be trying to instill that we've gotta get fresh produce away from them. We have to get more farmers to go direct to retail and and customers need to support them in that. I mean, I put a tweet out today on the farmers group that it was hashtag supermarkets. I just bought bin bags and bog rock.
You know, you know, we need to do something to kind of instill that. And and changing public habits and public perceptions is the hardest thing about that. It's, you know, getting farmers to go to direct retail, you know, even getting them to see a different farming model that they need to go and even perhaps even having more children to even accommodate that in the next generation where, you know, 2 or 3 could be doing the growing, 2 or 3 could be, you know, working on the retail side. You know, and all the legislation are supporting that, you know, business rate relief and tax relief with the right government in power could really help all that. But the the thing that's always been the hardest thing is just breaking that convenience and that repetition kind of model that that we're all in. You know, we really need people to wake up and go, you know, we need to be the change, you know. And your wallet is a weapon.
And I know it's gonna cost you a little bit more and it's gonna cost you a little bit more time, but you can't cheat. You can't cheat the system. Quality food and food security that comes from a a well secure food production system that's in private hands is well worth the extra cost. So yeah, we really gotta drive that one home.
[00:26:49] Unknown:
Yeah. And I think that, you know, when we did that rally in Truro, what, last year, I think it was, people stopped. They looked. They were they were listening, and they don't think about the things that they've just been and had a cake and actually every ingredient in that cake has come from a farmer. People aren't seeing the bigger picture, are they? And just with that little bit of, like, knowledge, it's like, oh, well, actually, I can make a difference here. And like you say, people have gotta wake up. They gotta think about their children's future. I mean, my son doesn't eat a lot of meat anyway, but the thought of a meat in a bit of lab meat, you know, nice, tasty.
[00:27:26] Unknown:
Well, it's down to us. You're never gonna you're never gonna hear the kind of things we talk about. I mean, they don't even advertise the food security very much on mainstream media as far as I'm aware. You know, you might get perhaps a Guardian journalist every now now and again chirp off about something, you know, try and link it to some sort of, you know, you know, something to do with the climate crisis or something. But, you know, they don't tell you this stuff because they don't want you to know. They don't want you thinking and campaigning about it. They just want you carrying on, you know, as you are normally and just doing what you're doing and and staying subservient and and, you know, staying staying in dark, basically. So it's down to people like us who are actively campaigning and raising awareness.
[00:28:11] Unknown:
And, I mean, you're doing a good job. I mean, that Facebook page has grown massively, isn't it? The pharmacy Yeah. It has. Cornwall. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. There was a good meeting on
[00:28:24] Unknown:
last night, in fact, near Saint Columb Major with quite a few farmers. And there was, the labor MP for Saint Austell was there, Noah Law. And, he fielded some questions and about the inheritance tax issue. And, we talked to quite a few people there and handed the leaflets out. And we've had we've had a bounce of, membership of about a 100 on the group since that. So Oh, brilliant. It is about just getting out there and being consistent and having the right message. But it's the ante has gotta go up now. We we kind of formed the group. We've laid out our case.
And now that this has happened, we do need to be more active. And we need to play our part in the coming actions that will be happening because I don't believe Labour will back down from this. We need to make sure that the right things happen and that we harness the full potential of this movement that's coming, this public awakening, and get the right information to people about really what is happening. This isn't just a surface level policy. This is deep level policy from a deep agenda that goes back way behind politics to the money power behind it and their, you know, long term intention to own all material resources and everybody on the planet. So it is as serious as that. It's it's a deep agenda and it's it's a it's a true battle of good and evil, and we need to play our part. And I I I pray that long blockading action or real disturbance of the nation doesn't materialize because we need to do spot actions like that. But we we mustn't fall into the trap of the direct action of the just stop oil type because that was very detrimental to their case and their cause with the general public. The farmers have got the general public support right now.
That's a treasure, and we need to keep it. And, you know, we need to be very mindful of that. So
[00:30:30] Unknown:
I mean, you've got 3 children, Pete. I mean, are you hoping that they're gonna follow on in your footsteps one day, or are you thinking, no. This is not for them? Yes. Hopefully. Because it's a wonderful way of life.
[00:30:40] Unknown:
Tell tell us how did you get into farming? Well, I was a music teacher originally in my early years. I had a a music a sort of music career for 9 or 10 years bear in various ways, recording engineer, session musician.
[00:30:57] Unknown:
What did you play?
[00:30:59] Unknown:
I played guitar. Oh, wow. And, I went to music college, was, played in several bands. I I was a backing musician for people and and stuff like that and had a wonderful time. But came to the age of about 29 and realized that I wasn't having steady enough income and was looking back at some of my school friends who had already got houses and things like that. And, did make a decision in my late twenties that I should be pursuing something else and and put the music into the, to the part time hobby, category. And, came to came to the southwest because because my brother was studying down here with his master's degree, and and I just, took work on an organic farm locally and absolutely loved it. And that's how I learned the trade.
Following on from that, I decided to specialize in salad leaf production once I was confident and have learned the ropes. And, that began a 17 year career of growing baby salad leaf, baby leaf spinach, and things like that. And we eventually became the largest, independent, producer of those products in the, in the Cornish market. We were selling through a local wholesaler, and, we were producing about 40 tons annually on 25 acres of ground. So, I became a professional farmer, and that went, that went really well up until COVID, and that's what derails us. And, we we've we've taken a different path since then. So
[00:32:32] Unknown:
And how how did COVID derail you, so to speak, then? Because I know everybody says like, oh, COVID killed my business. I mean, it more or less killed mine, to be honest with you. But is photography something different again?
[00:32:45] Unknown:
Well, our business was 95% to trade. Right. So we we were producing a 500 gram half kilo bag of this mixed leaf product, for use in hotels and restaurants. Only 5 percent was to retail outlet sales. So when they shut the hotels, that was absolute game over. And we just fortunately, we got away with it at the point in the season where we hadn't put too many forward costs in. And we were able to ditch ditch the season without too much of a loss. But there's no way we could have continued with the uncertainty, you know, of of plowing 1,000 and 1,000 of pounds worth of seed in. I mean, when you do baby lead production, you don't buy small packets of seed. You buy 25 kilos sacks of of brassica seed and lettuce seed and all these kind of things, and it's really expensive. So, you know, we had 5 5 full time staff including myself at the peak of the business. 6 6 or 7 part time in the pack house as well. So there's just no way you can keep those kind of costs running with the uncertainty of, you know, another close down coming in 2 weeks. So we had to ditch it. And we did we did an honesty box in actual fact to just to survive initially. I I just chopped a couple of acres of veg in. I back went back to mixed market gardening, grew a grew a bunch of veg that year, and we had an honesty box at the farm gate. And that went down ever so well. People were really, you know, using it, and it was it's ever so good. And, of course, people were asking us for bread and eggs and and and milk and things like that. So we decided to put a web store together, which we did. So, we did a click and collect eventually from the farm, for a good 18 months or so. And we had about 30 local Cornish producers supplying us in the end from cheese to shellfish, meats across the whole range. So great fun. Saw the retail side of it as well.
But, of course, as life got back to normal, the customers dropped off. And, before long, it was a labor who loved doing it. So we just decided to stop that. And I've gone back to just a small,
[00:34:52] Unknown:
organic no dig market garden with my polytunnels. I I supply about 6 customers locally. So when you say no dig, what does that mean? I mean, it's it's probably obvious. You don't dig.
[00:35:04] Unknown:
Well, yeah, that's the that's the the latest iteration in the organic growing movement, should I say. If anybody's listening, if they're familiar with Charles Dowding on YouTube, they'll know what I'm talking about. But it's essentially where instead of digging, you take a a piece of ground, a a just a patch of regular grass, and, you put thick cardboard down, and then you put a big thick layer of manure down, well rotted manure. So 6 or 8 inches to form the main bed. And then each year, you just top that up with an inch or 2 of well rotted manure or compost. And you grow into that. You put wood chips in the pathways, and you're essentially mimicking a mature ecosystem forest floor.
And that tricks many of the weeds. Well, it smothers a lot of the weeds anyway, but it tricks a lot of the other weeds that they're already in the mature ecosystem state so they don't germinate. You do have to obviously weed the airborne winds, dandelion and soft thistle that comes in and and stuff like that. But it's a a wonderful way of growing. It grows fantastic veg, and it's all about rebuilding the mycorrhizal networks and the, flora and fauna that the microbial the microbial life in the soil. Because you're not digging it, you're leaving those networks to grow and develop. And that makes the soil work, and it makes the nutrients that are already there available. And it all feeds back to the original thesis of lady Eve Balfour who founded the soil association. And and she believed along with her predecessors, people like Rudolf Steiner, that there's everything that you need in the soil. The soil has been there for since time began. So, you know, there really is a lot of mineral goodness in there, but we can't access it when we're disturbing the soil and not treating it properly. So it's effectively locked out. The vitamins and all the the gross stimulants are locked out. So if you cure that process by not digging and continually feeding with well rotted compost, it will take care of itself. And it will stabilize and produce lovely veg. And it does grow really good veg, really tasty, really fast growing veg. So I highly recommend it. It's not work free.
It's not a free pass at all. There's wheelbarrowing and stuff to do. And, of course, it's only applicable on a small scale. Well, you know, I'm a small scale market gardener now. It's not applicable to to farms farms, farm scale growing at all. Although people do grow it on on a bigger scale, if you've got enough people, you can go up to a, you know, a couple of acres or more with with it, and it's and it's highly productive. But, it is filling in that slot of the, local food resilience, the sort of, the peri urban, food growing areas around villages and towns that, that smaller growers and sort of community projects can can take on board. But, as a growing method, I I highly recommend it. Yeah. I think I'll give that a try, actually. We've got a little spot outside,
[00:38:15] Unknown:
and it's like, that's gonna be the veg plot for springtime. So, yeah, I'll have to look into that a bit more. Might have some potatoes to sell. So Well, you know, self self reliance is really important. It is. It is. And, you know, got I mean, I used to have a small holding in 4 acres. And when my marriage went pear shaped, I managed to keep the fields, but then eventually I needed to buy a house. And I didn't know anybody that had enough money to say, do you know what, Shelley? It's £1,000. Buy yourself a caravan and put it on the land. And I was one of the biggest regrets I've got selling those fields, but, hey, it's done. The opportunity will arise again, but it will cost me, like, 3 or 4 times the amount, I'm sure.
But, crazy. So what about what's going on with the whole solar power thing? Are are they bringing that in?
[00:39:09] Unknown:
Well, well, in my opinion, it's about to run completely out of control because there is an absolute eco loon as the secretary of state for energy and, net zero. Energy security and net zero, I should say, which it makes me chuckle every time if there's a if there ever was an oxymoron, there's one there. Energy security and net zero. So Ed Miliband is in the chair, and he well, we don't need any further, declaration of what his intent is. But when he first came into power, he passed 2 or 3 huge, 2 and a half 1000 ish acre solar farms in the Cambridge, Oxfordshire region. And, more of it will be coming to Cornwall if we don't do something about it. This is really serious.
We've really gotta get our message across to Cornwall Council that we gotta stop this. It's affecting food security. It's affecting agricultural jobs, and it's affecting the the, people's enjoyment of the countryside. And that will eventually, if more of this continues, that will affect tourism in Cornwall, which is a significant part of the Cornish economy. So, you know, we just can't afford that either. We did a freedom of information request in July of this year, and that came back as 5 over 5,000 acres already built for in planning application in Cornwall. So that's already half the size, almost half the size of the county farms estate that Cornwall Council actually managed for 10 of the farmers. So, you know, although the pro solar lobby will always say, oh, it's a tiny amount of the general land. It might only be a 1% or 2%. Well, firstly, don't believe their figures because they never give you the right acreage of what, you know, of the megawatt sort of, you know, can be produced.
There's always come some kind of fudge. But, we can't afford 1%, you know, when you go back to the figures I've given you about the food security and how quickly that's going down and that, you know, farm farmers making a profit is becoming a rare thing. In 2022, 10% of farms didn't turn a profit. A single year later, 17% didn't turn a profit. That's a that's an increase of 70% in 1 year. So, we just can't afford this. And there's, you know, it I tear my hair out really because, you know, even if you do agree that we do need some solar in in our energy portfolio mix, and I only agree to it being there as a 5% amount of our total generating capacity as a form of emergency power or a backup, it can be put on roofs. Rooftops are the perfect spot for it. And there's acres and acres of south facing roof space.
In fact, there's 4 times the amount of roof space available in the UK to deliver the 70 gigawatt that's proposed by the government to be put in place for 2035. So there isn't a single good reason to put solar panels on farmland. And the other thing they talk about is, oh, it's it's only put on poor grade land. It's only grade 3 b or below. That's a nonsense. All grades of farmland produce food. Grade 45 are the grassland grades. They give they give us dairy, and they give us meat. Now the grading systems really only relating to the profitability and the amount of crops that can be grown in grades 1, 2, and 3 a. They're just the best and most versatile. It means you could grow grains. You could do vegetables. You could do whatever, and you'll pretty much guaranteed to get a good economic return because the land is good and suitable in topography and and and all the rest of it. So, try try to put a division in there and say, oh, it's okay. We're only using rubbish land. It's absolute nonsense.
There's there's really just no good argument for for solar farms on farmland whatsoever. It clearly is just a virtue signaling gravy train, you know, and and a raid of of public tax money and and the green developers filling their pockets. And and poor desperate farmers cashing in on it because they've got no succession, and they've had such a hard time for, you know, for for decades. So it's hard to blame the farmers. Although, obviously, there will always be 1 or 2, how can I say, morally compromised bounty hunters? There always is. But for the most part, I don't think we can blame the farmers, and I don't.
It's just another agenda coming from this rogue state, and, we need to really fight hard on it.
[00:44:23] Unknown:
Yeah. Definitely. And, you know, we've only got, what, just over 10 minutes left, Pete. It goes quick. I don't know if you've seen today on Cornwall Live. This must be on other news as well, but they're saying about the change, the damaging contrails could be wiped out for £3.50 per plane ticket. Have you seen that? No. I haven't seen that. Well, there's a lot of funny comments, obviously. But, yeah, I'm surprised Cornwall Live have reported on it actually because we we've all been, making, you know, our pleas about chemtrails and contrails, those arguments for years now. And now it's come up that they are contrails. But if we pay £3.50 extra per plane ticket, then we can say goodbye to those trails.
[00:45:11] Unknown:
That's very interesting. I'll have to read it. The what what's the other information? What what is the 3 pound 50 supposed to be doing?
[00:45:18] Unknown:
Right. Let me have a little look. I've got my glasses on, and the writing's so tiny. Right. Let me read it to you because I found it well, it was comical, actually. Right. The climate damaging vapor trails from jet planes could be eliminated for just a few pounds per flight according to experts. Researchers say contrails, the white lines in the sky created by planes, can double the amount of warming caused by aviation's carbon emissions. But tweaking the flight paths of very few flights could reduce global contrail warming by more than half before 2,040, a study by the transport and environment advocacy group found.
This could be just 3% of flights, which according to the analysis, generate about 80% of the warming associated with contrails. The simple change is set to be explored for the first time in a at an adventure in the COP 29 UN Climate Conference taking place in Baku, Azerbaijan. I can't pronounce that. Contrails are made up of ice crystals which form when water vapor condenses on umbed fuel fragments in the plane's exhaust stream as it travels through cold human air. Transport and environment researchers said changing flight paths to avoid areas where contrails could form will only be needed on a small number of flights for just a short part of the journey at a cost of less than £3.50 per each flight.
The analysis showed the extra fuel burn to avoid contrails would be 5% or less, but 80% of the warming is from contrails would be eliminated. The climate benefits from avoiding most of the contrail warming would always be larger than the climate impact from the extra carbon emissions. Carlos Lopez de la Oza, aviation technical manager at transport and environment, said the aviation industry is being offered a simple and cheap way to reduce climate impact. Some industry actors overstate the scientific uncertainty of warming contrails, but the climate benefits of contrail avoidance are huge and solutions are improving by the day. By identifying the very few flights which cause warming contrails and tweaking their flight paths, we can have an immediate effect on contrails warming. So let's no longer discuss whether we have to do it, but how we're going to stop it.
So there is more, but I found that hilarious.
[00:47:40] Unknown:
Well, it sounds like you're gonna be coughing up extra money for the carbon dioxide nonsense. And, they're just using it as a good excuse to reinforce the narrative of that. Yeah. And, to try and give you some education about what you're thinking that you're seeing in the sky that they are, of course, just ice crystals and regular contrails.
[00:48:01] Unknown:
Which supposedly, they just disappear, don't they? Well, they should disappear as the plane is moving.
[00:48:07] Unknown:
Yes. That's right. They should do. But what we are seeing a lot are things that are very different to that. And it's, very hard to deny that some form of weather modification is being deployed. They are notably different to what I remember seeing, in the in the eighties. And, there's even refractive hazes. There was one very clear yesterday. There was a a kind of ring around the sun now that the sun's setting sort of, in different part of the of the sky as as it's getting towards winter. There was, a kind of halo around the sun and a and a little refractive like prism, prism sort of refraction kind of rainbow in the sky. It's very, very unusual.
Something is going on with the weather, and I'm I'm convinced of it. And, we we demand disclosure on it. We have a right to know what's going on and what's being done. And
[00:49:15] Unknown:
But they can't really deny it now. I don't think, can they? All of this all of these freak floods and stuff like that and all the work that's gone on beforehand. And I mean, people might think, Shelley, why are you bringing this up? We're talking about farming. But I brought it up because of the whole weather modification. Well, it's got a it's got a put a damper, a major damper on growing your crops at certain times of the year if they're not getting enough sunlight and stuff and the chemicals.
[00:49:42] Unknown:
Yeah. Of course. I mean, the the the the chemicals or or what they're putting up there, that that issue aside, the fact that they could be controlling the weather even if it's some kind of military weather warfare, and we are trying to create drought in the Russian breadbasket in relation to the conflict in that area. So therefore, the moisture has all got to be dumped over Western Europe before it gets there. And that's why we're getting the wet weather. So we're getting the rough end of the stick. If it's, you know, the the fact is it's destroying our yields. I mean, this year has been reported as being the 2nd worst harvest on record. So and that's directly related to the very, very wet winter, which, gave a lot of the weak wet feet and people weren't able to get on, and the sowing were late and all the rest of it. So, it's absolutely having a direct consequence on yield.
And, you know, when you do your research as many of us have done into this technology and you discover the, owning the web owning the weather, the weather as a force multiplier, multiplier, document that came out from the, American Navy. It's it's hard not to see it as being used in that some kind of way. And if you look at storm Dana that just happened in Almeria with those sort of egg sized hail, hailstones that utterly destroyed glass houses and polytunnels. I mean, I've seen some pictures of the cars there with dented bonnets and windscreens looking like they've been hit with baseball bats. And I I I've read one industry report saying that the hailstones came down with sufficient force and they were large enough to puncture through 800 gauge polythene that's on polytunnels. I mean, that's that stuff is thick and it's tough. So to be able to rip through that, it's some force. So, this these are really extreme weather events and we saw with the flooding there. So the 150 liters an hour or something coming down, absolutely devastating.
And this runs contrary to actually the data that's coming out of the IPCC because in their AR 6 report, the latest report, it even states that there's no evidence of an increase in extreme weather, extreme storms, flooding, coastal erosion, sea level rise, and all of these things. There's only some warming in the ocean at the pole, which is being recorded, which is totally natural because of the Atlantic, oscillation effects. So the scientists there are saying, look, there's no there's no good evidence to say that this that global warming is actually causing a lot of this at this point in time. And yet these events are happening, these catastrophic weather events.
So it's very, very suspicious. And, it leads back to a conclusion of of well, if if it is deliberate and they are attacking the food supply and they are attacking Europe, what is the agenda?
[00:52:58] Unknown:
Well, Patrick's just put a message in the chat. It says, Patrick's from Texas. A single hailstorm obliterated thousands of acres of solar panels, turning them into toxic waste dump in minutes. The media's relentless promotion of the green agenda feels eerily reminiscent of the COVID propaganda. Brace yourselves. This is just the beginning of the fallout from the globalist push for net zero emissions by 2050. Yeah. And the reason I ask you about that is because other farmers, you know, they've joined the group and stuff of well, obviously, it's a farmer group. How how do they react about this side of it, the whole geoengineering?
Because before, lots of us chemtrails, what load of rubbish. Are they wakening up to that a bit, or do you still keep that a little bit quiet?
[00:53:48] Unknown:
We we don't keep it quiet. We've got a policy on it, policy number 17. We actively talk about it. Some farmers are already very aware of it and and and some aren't. And you get the traditional knee jerk reaction from from some, not all. It depends how you you sort of, introduce them to it, and how gently. There's a there's a there is a kind of technique and a way of doing it. You have to kind of introduce it slowly and and, you know, sort of bring them to to, to inquire and and self realize. But, yes, we we've got 1 or 2 who who are absolutely this is utter utter nonsense. We're we're gonna hear nothing of it. And, they're always good for a challenge and a debate. But, encouragingly, yes, many are, if they're not already actively aware of it, they're they're kind of like when you tell them, they're like, well, you know, it wouldn't surprise me because, you know, everything does seem to have gone sort of piggity flip. There's no consistency to the seasons.
And that was my learning journey with it when I was farming about 2,005. I just the the patterns change. There was those long set periods of high pressure were were were a thing of the past. You know, you used to get to summer and it would be 6 weeks good and you just knew you could leave your tent out, you could leave your stuff out in the garden and all the rest of it and you'd be you'd be cracking on for weeks. But you don't get much more of a week from it these days before, you know, it gets sprayed over, cloud gets created, you know, a different weather system comes across.
And, so that I had felt within myself without actively self realizing. I I knew something was different, and it wasn't until I came across the knowledge in a talk from somebody else that all the pieces got put into place. And then I did my own research into it and went, wow. Yeah. This call it call it what you like. Call me a conspiracy theorist all day long. This is very very likely to be happening when you consider the economic value of it to people, the military use of it. Yeah. It's, it would be a massive surprise if if it wasn't happening. In fact, it's not happening. It's happening. So that's where I'm coming from. Yeah. It's happening.
[00:56:24] Unknown:
Yeah. Well, we've just got literally a couple of minutes left, Pete. Do you wanna say a few words about the upcoming rally in Truro?
[00:56:33] Unknown:
Sure. Yeah. Well, before I do that, thanks to the comment from Texas. God bless to all the American cousins over there. I hope you're doing well, And thank you for the for the point about solar farms. If you do have a a a storm like that, this this will ruin the farmland potentially forever. I mean, if there's, I mean, solar panels, because of their nature, they're they're covered in glass. The front face has to be glass. There's no polymers or plastics. I think there's a couple, but they're very very rarely used, probably because of their cost. But you just can't get the polymers that will stay clear for for for a long time baked out in the sun, which is their intended purpose. So they have to use glass. And if that glass gets shattered into smithereens, well, how can you graze animals on that land, you know, after that? And let alone the toxic compounds that might come out of the panel. So there's really an existential threat, you know, being put on the farmland for no good reason. It's all built on a fraud in the 1st place. So for for Cornwall Council to be continually passing these applications is absolutely crazy.
But anyway, thank you for the comment. God bless. And, back to the rally. Yes. We are out in Truro on Saturday, 23rd November. So if you're a farmer or if you're somebody who supports the farming community, if you've got even a 4 by 4, any vehicles are welcome. We're gonna meet at 12:30 at Truro livestock market. We're gonna come down into town and do a couple of laps around the town. And if you're supporting on foot, please be at Victoria Square at 12:30 to, to wait for the rally to pass by. So bring your flags. Bring bring bring your placards if you've got some anything to do with food security, ending the net zero nonsense, and all the rest of it. And we hope to see many of you there. We had a brilliant one last time. Let's make it a really good one again. The the we're the time is right. We need to get active. We need to push out there now as a group and get amongst the people. Well said. Well, with that, we're gonna end. Thank you so much, farmer Pete.
[00:58:48] Unknown:
Please look at come, Farmers Movement Cornwall Facebook, guys. And, literally, the pips are gonna go. So take care, Pete. Thank you so much for your time. It's been lovely to chat to you again. You too, Shelley. Yeah. Alright, my lovely. You take care. And, if I don't see you before, I will see you at that rally in a couple of weeks' time. Look forward to it. Brilliant. Thank you very much, Pete. Take care. Bye bye. Bye. Right. And with that, guys, I will be back same time next week, 7 o'clock. Have an awesome evening.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Shelley Tasker Show coming live out of radiosoakbox.com. It's good to have your company. Today's date is Wednesday, 13th November 2024. Happy hump day, everybody. I'm also streaming live on Rumble. So if you've got any questions, comments, please do so, and please feel free to give it a like and a subscribe. So great guests lined up this evening. This man is is a powerful figure in our local farmers movement, stood for local independent candidate a while ago, and he's still keeping on with the fight. Farmer Pete, good evening, and welcome to the show.
[00:01:34] Unknown:
Good evening, Shelley. Thank you for having me on the show again. No. You're welcome. Always lovely to have a catch up.
[00:01:40] Unknown:
And, got a busy sort of time ahead of you. We've, well, we've got a big rally coming up on Tuesday. I know it's more of a national one, but the following Saturday, you're, running a local rally in Truro, and it's all kicking off.
[00:01:58] Unknown:
Well, I mean, the inheritance tax attack, as I call it, in the recent budget has been the straw that's broken the camel's back for many people.
[00:02:11] Unknown:
It was bad enough before that, wasn't it? But now this is, like, one of the massive thing. Can you explain to the the listeners, necessarily in this country, what is going on with your whole inheritance tax?
[00:02:25] Unknown:
Well, there's been a proposal in the recent autumn budget by the current Labour government to effectively downgrade the amount of relief for this particular tax that farmers can claim. Previously, there was no liability for passing, an estate onto your son and daughter provided that the parent stayed alive for 7 years post gifting. That's now changed to various thresholds being put in whereby, effectively, a 50% rate of tax will have to be paid after a certain value. So although this equates to properties over the value of about £3,000,000, it's still very serious for farms because it it doesn't take a lot of land these days with land priced at 10 or £15,000 an acre for you to be quite cash poor as a farming business, but sitting on, you know, a valuable asset worth 3, 4, £5,000,000 quite easily. These are small farms.
And should you unfortunately pass away after gifting your family to your, to your children within the 7 year rule, then they, your your surviving descendants will be liable to, an effective rate of inheritance tax of 20% on the value of the estate. So this could very quickly mount up to tax bills of several £100,000. And that is a devastating blow for, well, any farm, let alone the small farms. And it will, of course, mean for a majority of them that the only way they can pay this bill is to sell land. That, of course, will downgrade the size of their business and affect their ability to, to make a profit and be viable as a business anyway. So it's gonna start a vicious downward cycle and, will result in the loss of lots of farms.
And, despite the claims made by the government that it was this will hardly affect any any farms, you know, 2 200 farms or so per year, I believe that's nonsense. It's going to affect a lot of farms. And this is very, very serious. And it comes at the end of a a war of attrition that's gone on with British farming as it has done with farming in Europe and much of the developed world. There seems to be an agenda to attack the farmers and somehow run them down to the point where they're not viable as businesses and somehow get access to the land. So, it's it's we have it's it's been an awful time. It's been a big shock.
Some people expected it to happen. Among those was myself. I thought this was coming. It's an absolute disaster, but we have to see something good come of it. It's getting people out, and we need to capitalize on the, feeling that's out there at the moment and, make sure we build our movement, and take full advantage of the situation.
[00:05:58] Unknown:
What an awful time for farmers. I mean, if things weren't bad enough and it's like you say, it's almost like they're literally just trying to out with the farmers. And if this comes into, like, agenda 21 30, you know, we know that they don't want us eating meat and things like that. But surely, we need the farmers even for the fruit and vegetables, for the plant based diet that we're going to eat.
[00:06:22] Unknown:
Well, if you look at the Sainsbury's future of food report, apparently not. It will all be generated in indoor vertical farms and be the creation of, the novel protein industry and lab meat and things like that. But, yes, it's, you know, there's there's no doubt. This is a a coordinated plan, and it goes back a long way. And it's clearly coming from the United Nations from the 17 sustainable development goals. In particular, number 13, climate action. This is where all the 2030 agenda and all the directives come, down through the World Economic Forum to government level and our faithful political establishment, as you know, like to just jet off there and receive their instructions for the coming year as to the, latest iteration of the plan. And that's why we get what we're getting, 15 minute cities, a war on car use,
[00:07:26] Unknown:
you know, and and we're hearing proposals about, you know, having to eat less meat and, you know, all the rest of it. So, yeah, it's a coordinated plan. Do they not ever bring in, like, the whole side, you know, or they want us on electric cars? Are they not bringing in, like, electric tractors for you guys?
[00:07:42] Unknown:
Yeah. The the battery storage technology just is not there. You know? It it just costs too much. I mean, you know, I know Tesla have got semi trucks coming out. But, you know, it it it's cost. Battery storage is just hugely expensive. We know that from costing out, when people make claims of wind farms and things like that. That, you know, we we can have battery storage to fill in those intermittent times where we have wind droughts and things like that. But the cost of it are absolutely enormous. You know, off the scale, not not, you know, ridiculous. So the battery storage isn't there. Even if it's technically possible to power a tractor with a battery, the cost will be prohibitive.
And, and the whole thing's based on nonsense, of course, anyway. You know, I mean, emissions aren't a problem in the countryside. The only reason that you would put an argument forward for electric cars in dense urban areas is on a quality of air issue. And and on that that issue, they do a good job, so they can be justified on that. But there's certainly no justification for electric cars on any, of the so called climate alarmism claims relating to, carbon dioxide being, you know, the gas of debt, should we say. It is, in fact, the gas of life, as I'm sure you're you're well aware. But,
[00:09:13] Unknown:
yeah. And do you think that Rachel Reeves, is she gonna take away the benefit to farmers using red diesel?
[00:09:19] Unknown:
Yes. Well, I mean, everybody's concentrated on the inheritance tax issue, but, of course, there there was 2 or 3 other things in the budget, and that was one of them. She's guaranteed it for another year, but that's it. So, who knows after that? My bet to be on, she's gonna remove it in the following year. So that's gonna be another hit to us. There was a hit on the classification of 4 by fours and pickup trucks whereby they're now classified as cars. And therefore, they come under a, a more strict tax regime. And they can't be offset as a capital asset. The the purchase can't be offset a 100% in the 1st year of purchase.
They can only be deducted at 6% a year. So, you know, this is just gonna end end up with you paying more tax. Of course, there was a big hit on hospitality industry. And, you know, I know that's just kind of offshoot of farming, but it's all related. The food sector is is our biggest manufacturing sector. And, you know, pubs, hotels, restaurants, they're all getting hit with much higher. I mean, they've they've doubled business rates for the hospitality sector. And along with employers, National Insurance has gone up. So despite their promise that they're not gonna tax the worker, they're taxing the bosses. So it's it's a disaster across the board. They've taxed everybody except the rich, which is really quite a thing to get your head around from a political party that calls themselves labor and is supposed to be the prime advocates for the working class. So,
[00:11:02] Unknown:
yeah, nothing good to to say of it, at all, Shelley. So it hasn't gone through then through the budget yet. Is it is it like a done deal or this is what the protest is about this coming Tuesday about the inheritance tax?
[00:11:17] Unknown:
Yes. They it is their proposals for the budget that will come in next April. Right. Okay. Okay. So, I I guess they're they're they will now just have to deal with the, you know, the political kickback from it as it happens. But, you know, they're in power. They've got the majority in parliament. So unless they sense, a kind of backbench rebellion or, you know, something of that nature that's actually gonna make them change course. No. This will be what it is, I'm afraid.
[00:11:54] Unknown:
And, ultimately, the way this is going, I mean, farming is just gonna be gone, isn't it? There there's no way in in this world that you guys can keep forking out. I mean, I'm surprised I'll say many of you, like, stay afloat now, literally.
[00:12:09] Unknown:
Well, it's really only been the fact that we've had advances in efficiency and technological development and in our methods of farming that keep returning gains as we're going along. Farming has been nothing but the history of starting with our bare hands and coming to the point that that that we are today with, advanced machinery, GPS, you know. And we're we're constantly returning efficiencies. If we think about the so called green revolution in the sixties seventies, this was the hybridizing of various types of wheat, which, had dwarfing genes. And these these genes were, found to deliver about 5 to 10% more yield from the wheat because it was lower to the ground. It was more sheltered, and it had put less energy into actually growing the actual stalk of the wheat and could put more into the actual grain, etcetera.
You know, the these constant iterations of progress are really the only thing that's been keeping our head above water because we've had no protectionism of any sort by a little point just after the second world war where we had, minimum prices and a deficiency payment scheme, under a labor government, funnily enough, introduced. It only lasted a couple of decades, but even so, that was something. But, really, going back to 1846 with the repeal of the corn laws, that was the last time we had any protectionism. And it's been open borders globalism ever since. And we've been left to, you know, left hung out to dry and fend for ourselves. It's been a, a kind of Darwinian experience, and and you can't help thinking that they're sort of, you know, watching it in some kind of hunger games, perverse enjoyment, seeing who's gonna make it and who's not. It's a disgrace, for a nation not to support their farmers.
So that's where we're at. The the the inheritance tax thing really is the end of a long long line of of dispute. And the the there's bad water and it runs very deep. It's deep. There's a lot of frustration down down and there's a lot of anger. And, we need to make sure that we deal with the coming protests in the right way for maximum effect. I mean, we've just gotta get these people out of power. But it's not just the Labour Party as you know. It's way bigger than that. This whole political establishment, the uni party collective, which unfortunately does include reform as good as they are on some things.
So we really need to get active now. People have just got to realize you've gotta put time, effort, and money into fighting this now. We can't sit back. We can't sit back now. They they have openly declared their agenda, to attack the farmers. And if they get their hands on the means of food production, then it does not bode well.
[00:15:09] Unknown:
And, I mean, the whole idea, I suppose, of the inheritance taxes so that they make more money in taxes because it's all about taxes, isn't it? Can you just, like, give a brief, like so if you sold your farm for a £1,000,000, how much of that would go to tax? Did you say 50%?
[00:15:27] Unknown:
Well, there's a £1,000,000 allowance per per person as I understand it. So a married couple would have a £1,000,000 allowance each. So that's 2,000,000. And then I believe there's a property relief as well, which the 2 the 2 parts of that combined come to 500,000 each as well. So as I understand it, it's a total of £3,000,000 worth of property. If your farm was worth 4,000,000 and you had to pay the tax, you would pay 20% on the £1,000,000 above the £3,000,000 threshold. So it's an effective rate of 20% anything above £3,000,000 as far as I understand it. So even at a £4,000,000 farm, that's a £200,000 tax bill. So It's a bloody hell, isn't it? Well Yes. Massive. And then if you think about yeah. If you think about the price of land, you know, just, a 300 acre farm, which is not a big farm at all by any means. I mean, just the land alone of between £10,000 or £15,000.
I mean, you're looking at 4,000,000 just in the value of land anyway, let alone the farmhouse, and we all know the price of property. So So what is the going rate at the moment for an acre of land in the UK? Well, farmland goes anywhere between £10,000 an acre to 15 on an agricultural sale in most parts of the country, certainly in the southwest that I'm aware of, and Central England. Perhaps it might be cheaper in Scotland. I don't know. But, of course, that's on large purchases the general public might want to buy perhaps for a paddock or something like that, then the the price goes up. And it's not uncommon to find even acres of land going for £50,000 in small parcels, because people want people want to have them as a sort of extension of their home environment. But generally speaking, 10 to 15,000 is the average for for farmland. So, you know, you're gonna get to 3 or £4,000,000
[00:17:37] Unknown:
in land alone on an average farm. So Yeah. Because I mean, I'm guessing all all your outgoings and stuff. I mean, fertilizer. There must be a small cost just in that alone.
[00:17:48] Unknown:
Well, yeah, farming's a a high intent a a high input business. You need to you need to front a lot of costs forward to the operation in order to grow the crop to make profit, hopefully. So
[00:18:01] Unknown:
And when people saw this might sound really a a little bit naive, but, like, if I was to go and buy a farm now, would I would I be expecting to buy all the machinery and everything that goes with it complete, or you just not?
[00:18:16] Unknown:
Not not usually. No. No. If if a farmer wants to retire or or perhaps passes away, and there's no succession, they'll normally be the machinery will normally be sold off. And then the land and building and and assets will be will be, will be put up for sale because another farmer coming in to buy it may not want to use the land, for the purposes that the previous farmer was was doing. So, yeah. It's not not doesn't usually come with the kit. Right. Okay. But, you know, talking about kit, you know, and and how expensive it is to farm, there's very little help for the actual purchasing of of the equipment. I mean, tractors are expensive now, you know.
An average 150 horsepower tractor is something like a £150,000. A decent combine harvester, £600,000. So, you know, most farms have a lot of money out as loans, and, you know, they're subject to the hikes in interest rates. And, this this is difficult for them when, when times are tough and the fry and the interest rates go up. So, you know, there needs to be a a low interest loan scheme for farmers. There's not enough support in the agricultural budget at all to provide for these kind of things. So, there there's a heap of stuff wrong. You know, the budget's way underfunded. There's no low interest loan scheme. There's no price protectionism against imports.
There's complaints of cheap wheat coming in now, and that can just pass straight through the ports, get rubber stamps. There's no accreditation schemes required for it, and it can go ahead of the queue to British milling firms. Whereas our wheat producers have to go through red tractor accreditation schemes and do all the paperwork and take on the extra cost for that for a British miller to take our flour. So, you know, it's the open borders issue is is on everything. It's on trade as well as the movement of people. So
[00:20:25] Unknown:
And how much food do we roughly have imported over here then?
[00:20:30] Unknown:
Well, the headline figure from DEFRA is that we import 46% of all the food we eat. So that's about half the food on your plate every year, is grown abroad. And that's shocking enough. But, I mean, some of that is stuff we can't grow here. Obviously, tropical fruit and things like that. But when you look at our indigenous crop, what I call indigenous crops, they're not really indigenous, but the crops that could be grown here in the British climate, when you look at production to annual consumption requirements of those crops, we've gone from 95% in the mid eighties to 73% today. So over 4 short decades, we've lost 23% of production. That's nearly 6% a decade in crops that we need, tonnage of crops that we need every year for consumption that we can grow here. So there's just absolutely need, no need for for that loss. That is complete outsourcing
[00:21:37] Unknown:
of British agricultural production, and that's really affecting our our self sufficient So are you saying that they're they're getting that abroad then rather than using the English farmers? Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. And is that because it's cheaper? Yep.
[00:21:52] Unknown:
It's because it's cheaper. So they're running British farmers down. More and more of them are going bust. I think we're down to 3 or 4 carrot growers in the east of the country now. So, you know, it's getting harder and harder for people to survive. The only way a grower can survive is to be a bigger fish in the pond. They have to wait for somebody else to pack up and then buy their business. So they become a bigger monopoly, and then they can operate a greater economy of scale. So it's driving everybody into this monopoly huge farming model.
And when we can't keep up with supply because there's just not enough of us doing it, then they they they just buy in from abroad. And, like I say, there's very little accreditation required. So these apart from the food miles issue, which runs completely contrary to the net zero religion, we've got food quality. They've got to, you know, there's gotta be harvested a long, you know, a long time before transport and, you know, the different standards, the environmental standards, and everything that comes with it. So and that's important with meats and things like that, especially, you know, when we're talking about food lock production where the animals might not even be on grass. They're just on on their earth being fed GMO feeds and routinely administered with growth hormones and antibiotics as, as just de rigueur treatments.
And, and there's no regulation about labeling that at all. So labeling is another really big issue, for the consumer. We need honest food labeling because all this kind of stuff is hidden. It's all just brushed under the carpet and the consumer is just continually barraged with this cheap food rhetoric. It's gotta be cheap. It's cheap, cheap, cheap. Get to the supermarket. Get it all cheap. And, you know, it's yeah. There's a lot there's a lot to unpick and a lot to do.
[00:23:48] Unknown:
Yeah. And I mean, our local in our town, we had one butcher, and at the end of this month, that butcher is closing down. So that's the last one in Cambourne town out of probably about 6 in total, you know, over the last 50 years or so. So, I mean, I've I source all of my meat from my local butchers, which is, like, in the village, 2 minute walk away from me. And I wouldn't dare now since I've gone down this whole farmer's movement thing and been finding out about food and stuff. I won't buy the meat. I mean, a couple of times I've been desperate and had to, but the bulk of it comes from the butchers because it's like like you say, labeling. How long does it take? Where did it come from? What was it packaged in? What's it been infused in to keep it fresh?
It's, it's frightening.
[00:24:35] Unknown:
That's right. I mean, we we do need as one of the solutions that hopefully will come out of this crisis is we really do need to kick start a direct to retail movement. We've got to break the monopoly and the centralization of the supermarkets. Now I know they're useful for things. Everybody uses them. You know, you you you're whipping past. You just need something. I know. They serve a purpose. But we really should be trying to instill that we've gotta get fresh produce away from them. We have to get more farmers to go direct to retail and and customers need to support them in that. I mean, I put a tweet out today on the farmers group that it was hashtag supermarkets. I just bought bin bags and bog rock.
You know, you know, we need to do something to kind of instill that. And and changing public habits and public perceptions is the hardest thing about that. It's, you know, getting farmers to go to direct retail, you know, even getting them to see a different farming model that they need to go and even perhaps even having more children to even accommodate that in the next generation where, you know, 2 or 3 could be doing the growing, 2 or 3 could be, you know, working on the retail side. You know, and all the legislation are supporting that, you know, business rate relief and tax relief with the right government in power could really help all that. But the the thing that's always been the hardest thing is just breaking that convenience and that repetition kind of model that that we're all in. You know, we really need people to wake up and go, you know, we need to be the change, you know. And your wallet is a weapon.
And I know it's gonna cost you a little bit more and it's gonna cost you a little bit more time, but you can't cheat. You can't cheat the system. Quality food and food security that comes from a a well secure food production system that's in private hands is well worth the extra cost. So yeah, we really gotta drive that one home.
[00:26:49] Unknown:
Yeah. And I think that, you know, when we did that rally in Truro, what, last year, I think it was, people stopped. They looked. They were they were listening, and they don't think about the things that they've just been and had a cake and actually every ingredient in that cake has come from a farmer. People aren't seeing the bigger picture, are they? And just with that little bit of, like, knowledge, it's like, oh, well, actually, I can make a difference here. And like you say, people have gotta wake up. They gotta think about their children's future. I mean, my son doesn't eat a lot of meat anyway, but the thought of a meat in a bit of lab meat, you know, nice, tasty.
[00:27:26] Unknown:
Well, it's down to us. You're never gonna you're never gonna hear the kind of things we talk about. I mean, they don't even advertise the food security very much on mainstream media as far as I'm aware. You know, you might get perhaps a Guardian journalist every now now and again chirp off about something, you know, try and link it to some sort of, you know, you know, something to do with the climate crisis or something. But, you know, they don't tell you this stuff because they don't want you to know. They don't want you thinking and campaigning about it. They just want you carrying on, you know, as you are normally and just doing what you're doing and and staying subservient and and, you know, staying staying in dark, basically. So it's down to people like us who are actively campaigning and raising awareness.
[00:28:11] Unknown:
And, I mean, you're doing a good job. I mean, that Facebook page has grown massively, isn't it? The pharmacy Yeah. It has. Cornwall. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. There was a good meeting on
[00:28:24] Unknown:
last night, in fact, near Saint Columb Major with quite a few farmers. And there was, the labor MP for Saint Austell was there, Noah Law. And, he fielded some questions and about the inheritance tax issue. And, we talked to quite a few people there and handed the leaflets out. And we've had we've had a bounce of, membership of about a 100 on the group since that. So Oh, brilliant. It is about just getting out there and being consistent and having the right message. But it's the ante has gotta go up now. We we kind of formed the group. We've laid out our case.
And now that this has happened, we do need to be more active. And we need to play our part in the coming actions that will be happening because I don't believe Labour will back down from this. We need to make sure that the right things happen and that we harness the full potential of this movement that's coming, this public awakening, and get the right information to people about really what is happening. This isn't just a surface level policy. This is deep level policy from a deep agenda that goes back way behind politics to the money power behind it and their, you know, long term intention to own all material resources and everybody on the planet. So it is as serious as that. It's it's a deep agenda and it's it's a it's a true battle of good and evil, and we need to play our part. And I I I pray that long blockading action or real disturbance of the nation doesn't materialize because we need to do spot actions like that. But we we mustn't fall into the trap of the direct action of the just stop oil type because that was very detrimental to their case and their cause with the general public. The farmers have got the general public support right now.
That's a treasure, and we need to keep it. And, you know, we need to be very mindful of that. So
[00:30:30] Unknown:
I mean, you've got 3 children, Pete. I mean, are you hoping that they're gonna follow on in your footsteps one day, or are you thinking, no. This is not for them? Yes. Hopefully. Because it's a wonderful way of life.
[00:30:40] Unknown:
Tell tell us how did you get into farming? Well, I was a music teacher originally in my early years. I had a a music a sort of music career for 9 or 10 years bear in various ways, recording engineer, session musician.
[00:30:57] Unknown:
What did you play?
[00:30:59] Unknown:
I played guitar. Oh, wow. And, I went to music college, was, played in several bands. I I was a backing musician for people and and stuff like that and had a wonderful time. But came to the age of about 29 and realized that I wasn't having steady enough income and was looking back at some of my school friends who had already got houses and things like that. And, did make a decision in my late twenties that I should be pursuing something else and and put the music into the, to the part time hobby, category. And, came to came to the southwest because because my brother was studying down here with his master's degree, and and I just, took work on an organic farm locally and absolutely loved it. And that's how I learned the trade.
Following on from that, I decided to specialize in salad leaf production once I was confident and have learned the ropes. And, that began a 17 year career of growing baby salad leaf, baby leaf spinach, and things like that. And we eventually became the largest, independent, producer of those products in the, in the Cornish market. We were selling through a local wholesaler, and, we were producing about 40 tons annually on 25 acres of ground. So, I became a professional farmer, and that went, that went really well up until COVID, and that's what derails us. And, we we've we've taken a different path since then. So
[00:32:32] Unknown:
And how how did COVID derail you, so to speak, then? Because I know everybody says like, oh, COVID killed my business. I mean, it more or less killed mine, to be honest with you. But is photography something different again?
[00:32:45] Unknown:
Well, our business was 95% to trade. Right. So we we were producing a 500 gram half kilo bag of this mixed leaf product, for use in hotels and restaurants. Only 5 percent was to retail outlet sales. So when they shut the hotels, that was absolute game over. And we just fortunately, we got away with it at the point in the season where we hadn't put too many forward costs in. And we were able to ditch ditch the season without too much of a loss. But there's no way we could have continued with the uncertainty, you know, of of plowing 1,000 and 1,000 of pounds worth of seed in. I mean, when you do baby lead production, you don't buy small packets of seed. You buy 25 kilos sacks of of brassica seed and lettuce seed and all these kind of things, and it's really expensive. So, you know, we had 5 5 full time staff including myself at the peak of the business. 6 6 or 7 part time in the pack house as well. So there's just no way you can keep those kind of costs running with the uncertainty of, you know, another close down coming in 2 weeks. So we had to ditch it. And we did we did an honesty box in actual fact to just to survive initially. I I just chopped a couple of acres of veg in. I back went back to mixed market gardening, grew a grew a bunch of veg that year, and we had an honesty box at the farm gate. And that went down ever so well. People were really, you know, using it, and it was it's ever so good. And, of course, people were asking us for bread and eggs and and and milk and things like that. So we decided to put a web store together, which we did. So, we did a click and collect eventually from the farm, for a good 18 months or so. And we had about 30 local Cornish producers supplying us in the end from cheese to shellfish, meats across the whole range. So great fun. Saw the retail side of it as well.
But, of course, as life got back to normal, the customers dropped off. And, before long, it was a labor who loved doing it. So we just decided to stop that. And I've gone back to just a small,
[00:34:52] Unknown:
organic no dig market garden with my polytunnels. I I supply about 6 customers locally. So when you say no dig, what does that mean? I mean, it's it's probably obvious. You don't dig.
[00:35:04] Unknown:
Well, yeah, that's the that's the the latest iteration in the organic growing movement, should I say. If anybody's listening, if they're familiar with Charles Dowding on YouTube, they'll know what I'm talking about. But it's essentially where instead of digging, you take a a piece of ground, a a just a patch of regular grass, and, you put thick cardboard down, and then you put a big thick layer of manure down, well rotted manure. So 6 or 8 inches to form the main bed. And then each year, you just top that up with an inch or 2 of well rotted manure or compost. And you grow into that. You put wood chips in the pathways, and you're essentially mimicking a mature ecosystem forest floor.
And that tricks many of the weeds. Well, it smothers a lot of the weeds anyway, but it tricks a lot of the other weeds that they're already in the mature ecosystem state so they don't germinate. You do have to obviously weed the airborne winds, dandelion and soft thistle that comes in and and stuff like that. But it's a a wonderful way of growing. It grows fantastic veg, and it's all about rebuilding the mycorrhizal networks and the, flora and fauna that the microbial the microbial life in the soil. Because you're not digging it, you're leaving those networks to grow and develop. And that makes the soil work, and it makes the nutrients that are already there available. And it all feeds back to the original thesis of lady Eve Balfour who founded the soil association. And and she believed along with her predecessors, people like Rudolf Steiner, that there's everything that you need in the soil. The soil has been there for since time began. So, you know, there really is a lot of mineral goodness in there, but we can't access it when we're disturbing the soil and not treating it properly. So it's effectively locked out. The vitamins and all the the gross stimulants are locked out. So if you cure that process by not digging and continually feeding with well rotted compost, it will take care of itself. And it will stabilize and produce lovely veg. And it does grow really good veg, really tasty, really fast growing veg. So I highly recommend it. It's not work free.
It's not a free pass at all. There's wheelbarrowing and stuff to do. And, of course, it's only applicable on a small scale. Well, you know, I'm a small scale market gardener now. It's not applicable to to farms farms, farm scale growing at all. Although people do grow it on on a bigger scale, if you've got enough people, you can go up to a, you know, a couple of acres or more with with it, and it's and it's highly productive. But, it is filling in that slot of the, local food resilience, the sort of, the peri urban, food growing areas around villages and towns that, that smaller growers and sort of community projects can can take on board. But, as a growing method, I I highly recommend it. Yeah. I think I'll give that a try, actually. We've got a little spot outside,
[00:38:15] Unknown:
and it's like, that's gonna be the veg plot for springtime. So, yeah, I'll have to look into that a bit more. Might have some potatoes to sell. So Well, you know, self self reliance is really important. It is. It is. And, you know, got I mean, I used to have a small holding in 4 acres. And when my marriage went pear shaped, I managed to keep the fields, but then eventually I needed to buy a house. And I didn't know anybody that had enough money to say, do you know what, Shelley? It's £1,000. Buy yourself a caravan and put it on the land. And I was one of the biggest regrets I've got selling those fields, but, hey, it's done. The opportunity will arise again, but it will cost me, like, 3 or 4 times the amount, I'm sure.
But, crazy. So what about what's going on with the whole solar power thing? Are are they bringing that in?
[00:39:09] Unknown:
Well, well, in my opinion, it's about to run completely out of control because there is an absolute eco loon as the secretary of state for energy and, net zero. Energy security and net zero, I should say, which it makes me chuckle every time if there's a if there ever was an oxymoron, there's one there. Energy security and net zero. So Ed Miliband is in the chair, and he well, we don't need any further, declaration of what his intent is. But when he first came into power, he passed 2 or 3 huge, 2 and a half 1000 ish acre solar farms in the Cambridge, Oxfordshire region. And, more of it will be coming to Cornwall if we don't do something about it. This is really serious.
We've really gotta get our message across to Cornwall Council that we gotta stop this. It's affecting food security. It's affecting agricultural jobs, and it's affecting the the, people's enjoyment of the countryside. And that will eventually, if more of this continues, that will affect tourism in Cornwall, which is a significant part of the Cornish economy. So, you know, we just can't afford that either. We did a freedom of information request in July of this year, and that came back as 5 over 5,000 acres already built for in planning application in Cornwall. So that's already half the size, almost half the size of the county farms estate that Cornwall Council actually managed for 10 of the farmers. So, you know, although the pro solar lobby will always say, oh, it's a tiny amount of the general land. It might only be a 1% or 2%. Well, firstly, don't believe their figures because they never give you the right acreage of what, you know, of the megawatt sort of, you know, can be produced.
There's always come some kind of fudge. But, we can't afford 1%, you know, when you go back to the figures I've given you about the food security and how quickly that's going down and that, you know, farm farmers making a profit is becoming a rare thing. In 2022, 10% of farms didn't turn a profit. A single year later, 17% didn't turn a profit. That's a that's an increase of 70% in 1 year. So, we just can't afford this. And there's, you know, it I tear my hair out really because, you know, even if you do agree that we do need some solar in in our energy portfolio mix, and I only agree to it being there as a 5% amount of our total generating capacity as a form of emergency power or a backup, it can be put on roofs. Rooftops are the perfect spot for it. And there's acres and acres of south facing roof space.
In fact, there's 4 times the amount of roof space available in the UK to deliver the 70 gigawatt that's proposed by the government to be put in place for 2035. So there isn't a single good reason to put solar panels on farmland. And the other thing they talk about is, oh, it's it's only put on poor grade land. It's only grade 3 b or below. That's a nonsense. All grades of farmland produce food. Grade 45 are the grassland grades. They give they give us dairy, and they give us meat. Now the grading systems really only relating to the profitability and the amount of crops that can be grown in grades 1, 2, and 3 a. They're just the best and most versatile. It means you could grow grains. You could do vegetables. You could do whatever, and you'll pretty much guaranteed to get a good economic return because the land is good and suitable in topography and and and all the rest of it. So, try try to put a division in there and say, oh, it's okay. We're only using rubbish land. It's absolute nonsense.
There's there's really just no good argument for for solar farms on farmland whatsoever. It clearly is just a virtue signaling gravy train, you know, and and a raid of of public tax money and and the green developers filling their pockets. And and poor desperate farmers cashing in on it because they've got no succession, and they've had such a hard time for, you know, for for decades. So it's hard to blame the farmers. Although, obviously, there will always be 1 or 2, how can I say, morally compromised bounty hunters? There always is. But for the most part, I don't think we can blame the farmers, and I don't.
It's just another agenda coming from this rogue state, and, we need to really fight hard on it.
[00:44:23] Unknown:
Yeah. Definitely. And, you know, we've only got, what, just over 10 minutes left, Pete. It goes quick. I don't know if you've seen today on Cornwall Live. This must be on other news as well, but they're saying about the change, the damaging contrails could be wiped out for £3.50 per plane ticket. Have you seen that? No. I haven't seen that. Well, there's a lot of funny comments, obviously. But, yeah, I'm surprised Cornwall Live have reported on it actually because we we've all been, making, you know, our pleas about chemtrails and contrails, those arguments for years now. And now it's come up that they are contrails. But if we pay £3.50 extra per plane ticket, then we can say goodbye to those trails.
[00:45:11] Unknown:
That's very interesting. I'll have to read it. The what what's the other information? What what is the 3 pound 50 supposed to be doing?
[00:45:18] Unknown:
Right. Let me have a little look. I've got my glasses on, and the writing's so tiny. Right. Let me read it to you because I found it well, it was comical, actually. Right. The climate damaging vapor trails from jet planes could be eliminated for just a few pounds per flight according to experts. Researchers say contrails, the white lines in the sky created by planes, can double the amount of warming caused by aviation's carbon emissions. But tweaking the flight paths of very few flights could reduce global contrail warming by more than half before 2,040, a study by the transport and environment advocacy group found.
This could be just 3% of flights, which according to the analysis, generate about 80% of the warming associated with contrails. The simple change is set to be explored for the first time in a at an adventure in the COP 29 UN Climate Conference taking place in Baku, Azerbaijan. I can't pronounce that. Contrails are made up of ice crystals which form when water vapor condenses on umbed fuel fragments in the plane's exhaust stream as it travels through cold human air. Transport and environment researchers said changing flight paths to avoid areas where contrails could form will only be needed on a small number of flights for just a short part of the journey at a cost of less than £3.50 per each flight.
The analysis showed the extra fuel burn to avoid contrails would be 5% or less, but 80% of the warming is from contrails would be eliminated. The climate benefits from avoiding most of the contrail warming would always be larger than the climate impact from the extra carbon emissions. Carlos Lopez de la Oza, aviation technical manager at transport and environment, said the aviation industry is being offered a simple and cheap way to reduce climate impact. Some industry actors overstate the scientific uncertainty of warming contrails, but the climate benefits of contrail avoidance are huge and solutions are improving by the day. By identifying the very few flights which cause warming contrails and tweaking their flight paths, we can have an immediate effect on contrails warming. So let's no longer discuss whether we have to do it, but how we're going to stop it.
So there is more, but I found that hilarious.
[00:47:40] Unknown:
Well, it sounds like you're gonna be coughing up extra money for the carbon dioxide nonsense. And, they're just using it as a good excuse to reinforce the narrative of that. Yeah. And, to try and give you some education about what you're thinking that you're seeing in the sky that they are, of course, just ice crystals and regular contrails.
[00:48:01] Unknown:
Which supposedly, they just disappear, don't they? Well, they should disappear as the plane is moving.
[00:48:07] Unknown:
Yes. That's right. They should do. But what we are seeing a lot are things that are very different to that. And it's, very hard to deny that some form of weather modification is being deployed. They are notably different to what I remember seeing, in the in the eighties. And, there's even refractive hazes. There was one very clear yesterday. There was a a kind of ring around the sun now that the sun's setting sort of, in different part of the of the sky as as it's getting towards winter. There was, a kind of halo around the sun and a and a little refractive like prism, prism sort of refraction kind of rainbow in the sky. It's very, very unusual.
Something is going on with the weather, and I'm I'm convinced of it. And, we we demand disclosure on it. We have a right to know what's going on and what's being done. And
[00:49:15] Unknown:
But they can't really deny it now. I don't think, can they? All of this all of these freak floods and stuff like that and all the work that's gone on beforehand. And I mean, people might think, Shelley, why are you bringing this up? We're talking about farming. But I brought it up because of the whole weather modification. Well, it's got a it's got a put a damper, a major damper on growing your crops at certain times of the year if they're not getting enough sunlight and stuff and the chemicals.
[00:49:42] Unknown:
Yeah. Of course. I mean, the the the the chemicals or or what they're putting up there, that that issue aside, the fact that they could be controlling the weather even if it's some kind of military weather warfare, and we are trying to create drought in the Russian breadbasket in relation to the conflict in that area. So therefore, the moisture has all got to be dumped over Western Europe before it gets there. And that's why we're getting the wet weather. So we're getting the rough end of the stick. If it's, you know, the the fact is it's destroying our yields. I mean, this year has been reported as being the 2nd worst harvest on record. So and that's directly related to the very, very wet winter, which, gave a lot of the weak wet feet and people weren't able to get on, and the sowing were late and all the rest of it. So, it's absolutely having a direct consequence on yield.
And, you know, when you do your research as many of us have done into this technology and you discover the, owning the web owning the weather, the weather as a force multiplier, multiplier, document that came out from the, American Navy. It's it's hard not to see it as being used in that some kind of way. And if you look at storm Dana that just happened in Almeria with those sort of egg sized hail, hailstones that utterly destroyed glass houses and polytunnels. I mean, I've seen some pictures of the cars there with dented bonnets and windscreens looking like they've been hit with baseball bats. And I I I've read one industry report saying that the hailstones came down with sufficient force and they were large enough to puncture through 800 gauge polythene that's on polytunnels. I mean, that's that stuff is thick and it's tough. So to be able to rip through that, it's some force. So, this these are really extreme weather events and we saw with the flooding there. So the 150 liters an hour or something coming down, absolutely devastating.
And this runs contrary to actually the data that's coming out of the IPCC because in their AR 6 report, the latest report, it even states that there's no evidence of an increase in extreme weather, extreme storms, flooding, coastal erosion, sea level rise, and all of these things. There's only some warming in the ocean at the pole, which is being recorded, which is totally natural because of the Atlantic, oscillation effects. So the scientists there are saying, look, there's no there's no good evidence to say that this that global warming is actually causing a lot of this at this point in time. And yet these events are happening, these catastrophic weather events.
So it's very, very suspicious. And, it leads back to a conclusion of of well, if if it is deliberate and they are attacking the food supply and they are attacking Europe, what is the agenda?
[00:52:58] Unknown:
Well, Patrick's just put a message in the chat. It says, Patrick's from Texas. A single hailstorm obliterated thousands of acres of solar panels, turning them into toxic waste dump in minutes. The media's relentless promotion of the green agenda feels eerily reminiscent of the COVID propaganda. Brace yourselves. This is just the beginning of the fallout from the globalist push for net zero emissions by 2050. Yeah. And the reason I ask you about that is because other farmers, you know, they've joined the group and stuff of well, obviously, it's a farmer group. How how do they react about this side of it, the whole geoengineering?
Because before, lots of us chemtrails, what load of rubbish. Are they wakening up to that a bit, or do you still keep that a little bit quiet?
[00:53:48] Unknown:
We we don't keep it quiet. We've got a policy on it, policy number 17. We actively talk about it. Some farmers are already very aware of it and and and some aren't. And you get the traditional knee jerk reaction from from some, not all. It depends how you you sort of, introduce them to it, and how gently. There's a there's a there is a kind of technique and a way of doing it. You have to kind of introduce it slowly and and, you know, sort of bring them to to, to inquire and and self realize. But, yes, we we've got 1 or 2 who who are absolutely this is utter utter nonsense. We're we're gonna hear nothing of it. And, they're always good for a challenge and a debate. But, encouragingly, yes, many are, if they're not already actively aware of it, they're they're kind of like when you tell them, they're like, well, you know, it wouldn't surprise me because, you know, everything does seem to have gone sort of piggity flip. There's no consistency to the seasons.
And that was my learning journey with it when I was farming about 2,005. I just the the patterns change. There was those long set periods of high pressure were were were a thing of the past. You know, you used to get to summer and it would be 6 weeks good and you just knew you could leave your tent out, you could leave your stuff out in the garden and all the rest of it and you'd be you'd be cracking on for weeks. But you don't get much more of a week from it these days before, you know, it gets sprayed over, cloud gets created, you know, a different weather system comes across.
And, so that I had felt within myself without actively self realizing. I I knew something was different, and it wasn't until I came across the knowledge in a talk from somebody else that all the pieces got put into place. And then I did my own research into it and went, wow. Yeah. This call it call it what you like. Call me a conspiracy theorist all day long. This is very very likely to be happening when you consider the economic value of it to people, the military use of it. Yeah. It's, it would be a massive surprise if if it wasn't happening. In fact, it's not happening. It's happening. So that's where I'm coming from. Yeah. It's happening.
[00:56:24] Unknown:
Yeah. Well, we've just got literally a couple of minutes left, Pete. Do you wanna say a few words about the upcoming rally in Truro?
[00:56:33] Unknown:
Sure. Yeah. Well, before I do that, thanks to the comment from Texas. God bless to all the American cousins over there. I hope you're doing well, And thank you for the for the point about solar farms. If you do have a a a storm like that, this this will ruin the farmland potentially forever. I mean, if there's, I mean, solar panels, because of their nature, they're they're covered in glass. The front face has to be glass. There's no polymers or plastics. I think there's a couple, but they're very very rarely used, probably because of their cost. But you just can't get the polymers that will stay clear for for for a long time baked out in the sun, which is their intended purpose. So they have to use glass. And if that glass gets shattered into smithereens, well, how can you graze animals on that land, you know, after that? And let alone the toxic compounds that might come out of the panel. So there's really an existential threat, you know, being put on the farmland for no good reason. It's all built on a fraud in the 1st place. So for for Cornwall Council to be continually passing these applications is absolutely crazy.
But anyway, thank you for the comment. God bless. And, back to the rally. Yes. We are out in Truro on Saturday, 23rd November. So if you're a farmer or if you're somebody who supports the farming community, if you've got even a 4 by 4, any vehicles are welcome. We're gonna meet at 12:30 at Truro livestock market. We're gonna come down into town and do a couple of laps around the town. And if you're supporting on foot, please be at Victoria Square at 12:30 to, to wait for the rally to pass by. So bring your flags. Bring bring bring your placards if you've got some anything to do with food security, ending the net zero nonsense, and all the rest of it. And we hope to see many of you there. We had a brilliant one last time. Let's make it a really good one again. The the we're the time is right. We need to get active. We need to push out there now as a group and get amongst the people. Well said. Well, with that, we're gonna end. Thank you so much, farmer Pete.
[00:58:48] Unknown:
Please look at come, Farmers Movement Cornwall Facebook, guys. And, literally, the pips are gonna go. So take care, Pete. Thank you so much for your time. It's been lovely to chat to you again. You too, Shelley. Yeah. Alright, my lovely. You take care. And, if I don't see you before, I will see you at that rally in a couple of weeks' time. Look forward to it. Brilliant. Thank you very much, Pete. Take care. Bye bye. Bye. Right. And with that, guys, I will be back same time next week, 7 o'clock. Have an awesome evening.
Introduction and Guest Introduction
Farmer Pete on Inheritance Tax
Impact of Government Policies on Farming
Challenges in the Farming Industry
Farming Costs and Economic Pressures
Direct to Retail Movement
Transition to Organic Farming
Solar Power and Its Impact on Farmland
Weather Modification and Its Effects
Upcoming Rally and Closing Remarks
