Brexit impact

Government should back British farming standards in global market, says Welby

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The Church of England owns very large swathes of agricultural land. I hope its land agents are listening to Mr Welby….This article tells us:

The Government must work with farmers to encourage good trade deals that preserve UK export standards, the Archbishop of Canterbury has said.

Archbishop Welby was delivering the annual Henry Plumb Lecture to the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) on Monday night. The NFU represents 48,000 farming businesses around the country.

“In a post-Brexit era, a time of such globalisation, our farming communities can lead the way on food standards, animal welfare, trade and exports that make people’s lives better and more prosperous around the world,” he said.

Since Britain had left the European Union and its trade deals, the farming community had a unique opportunity to be at the heart of building and rebuilding relationships abroad. “Making the most of the overseas market post-Brexit is crucial. We need to get our trade deals right to protect the world-class British standards of farming — bad deals risk exporting environmental and animal-welfare harms and destroying farmers’ livelihoods.

“Government needs to partner with farmers to build global ambition and increase the British food brand identity across the world to grow global markets.”

He continued: “The new Agriculture Act means there is an opportunity for British farming to become a global leader in sustainable, climate-friendly, high-standard food production.”

Farmers, like the clergy and churchpeople, were also well-placed to bridge the gap between rural and urban communities at home, Archbishop Welby said. There was much ignorance in the UK about the realities of farming and rural life, particularly within urban communities — which, he said, need “to understand better the value rural Britain offers”, the challenges it faces, and what is behind the food on people’s plates. (At the start of the lecture, he admitted to learning much about the difficulties of farming life from the Jeremy Clarkson series on Amazon.)

Rural firms to ‘lose out on millions’ after funding cut

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A major challenge is exposed here, it regards the imposition of a rurally disadvantaged approach to the follow on from EU funding, smuggled into the small print around the budget, which fortunately the CLA are onto, but which merits some concerted lobbying and action. This article tells us.

Rural firms are set to lose out on hundreds of millions under revised funding plans unveiled in the recent Budget, the Country Land and Business Association has warned.

The CLA, which represents 28,000 rural businesses and farmers, has criticised the government for removing support aimed at levelling up the rural economy.

The group found that spending plans under the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) will lead to a shortfall of £315 million for rural businesses over a seven-year period.

The figure represents the discrepancy in funding assigned to tackling regional economic disparities through the EU’s Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF), versus what will be received under the UKSPF to bolster rural productivity.

But the government’s new plans signal a marked shift from previous EU investment models, where rural areas benefitted from a ringfenced fund every year. 

Closer inspection of the 2021/2022 Budget shows that there will be no dedicated funding in the UKSPF for rural businesses, as the ESIF rural fund had already been allocated for 2020/2021.

NHS is at breaking point and putting patients at high risk, bosses warn

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I fear its going to be very difficult and not just because of covid for those people who get ill in rural settings in England this year. This story tells us:

The survey of the most senior executives running hospitals, ambulance services, mental health providers, community services, primary care and integrated care systems comes hours before new performance figures for the NHS in England are due to be published.

The number of people waiting for hospital treatment in England has hit a record high of 5.7 million as the NHS struggles to clear the backlog of care that has been worsened by the pandemic. Updated figures are expected on Thursday.

The greatest areas of concern for NHS leaders are primary care, and urgent and emergency care, according to the survey.

Matthew Taylor, the chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said: “Almost every healthcare leader we’ve spoken to is warning that the NHS is under unsustainable pressure, and they are worried the situation will worsen, as we head into deep midwinter, unless action is taken. They are also sounding alarm bells over risks to patient safety if their services become overwhelmed, on top of a severe workforce crisis.

“The health and social care secretary says the NHS is not under unsustainable pressure, but NHS leaders are clear that we have reached a tipping point. Frontline providers across all parts of the NHS are under intolerable pressure.”

Staffing agencies triple rates as care homes and NHS fight over nurses

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Workforce shortages are the biggest challenge assailing health and care and are at their most acute in rural settings around care. This article points to some people getting rather rich off the back of this situation. It tells us:

Nursing shortages are allowing “profiteering” staffing agencies to triple their rates, care leaders have warned, raising the risk of vulnerable patients being forced to move care homes and increasing the burden on the NHS.

The crisis is forcing some nursing homes to become standard residential care homes without support for people with chronic diseases.

The shortage also makes it harder for NHS hospitals to discharge patients. Some hospitals have redeployed their own staff into nursing homes to free beds in hospitals. In other places, NHS trusts are competing for staff with care providers.

Geoff Butcher, director of Blackadder Corporation, which runs six homes in the West Midlands, said that he paid nurses about £19.50 an hour, slightly higher than the NHS rate of £16.52. “Two of our nurses resigned recently and they’ve gone to an agency for £35 an hour,” he said. “And that agency then came to us and said we can have these staff back at £52 an hour. They want £95 an hour for those nurses on a bank holiday nightshift. It’s utterly unaffordable.

Supermarkets using cardboard cutouts to hide gaps left by supply issues

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Nothing to see here – move on…..

Shoppers have spotted fake carrots in Fakenham, cardboard asparagus in London, pictures of oranges and grapes in Milton Keynes, and 2D washing liquid bottles in Cambridge. Sainsbury’s has also used outline drawings of packaging to fill shelves.

The tactic comes as shortages of HGV drivers and pickers and packers on farms and food processing plants lead to low availability of some items in supermarkets. Problems at ports, where handlers are struggling to cope with a surge in deliveries for the festive season, are also leading to shortages.

Bryan Roberts, a retail analyst at Shopfloor Insights, said he had only begun to see the cardboard cutouts of fresh produce in the past year, but said similar tactics had been in place elsewhere in supermarkets for some time. “It has become quite commonplace. It is not only because of shortages, but because a lot of the larger stores are now simply too big.”

He said the cutouts were one of an array of tactics being used to fill space, including filling meat fridges with bottles of tomato sauce or mayonnaise, spreading packs of beer out across whole aisles, and erecting large posters or other marketing material.

Tesco, which has boasted that its sales have been boosted by its ability to keep shelves stocked, said the fruit and vegetable pictures were not linked to the recent supply chain issues and had been in use for many months.

Traditional supermarkets, which can stock more than 40,000 product lines, have been honing their grocery ranges to improve efficiency so they can cut prices and compete more effectively with discounters such as Aldi and Lidl, which sell fewer than 3,000 different products.

That process has only been accelerated by Brexit and the pandemic which have led to staff shortages and difficulties in shipping goods. Supermarkets and manufacturers have reduced the range of different types of pasta, coffee or teas they sell to make it easier to keep goods flowing.

U.K. to Probe Extent of Country’s Food Supply-Chain Woes

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This extract from Blomberg gives a flavour of how a key rural story is being reported in the US. Sometimes its interesting to look through a different organisation’s eyes to get a challenging or re-affirming perspective.  This article gives us a useful flavour of the agenda for the upcoming food inquiry it tells us:

The U.K. government is starting an investigation into just how badly labor shortages, Brexit and surging commodity prices are hurting the country’s food industry.

A lack of key workers such as truck drivers is pushing businesses toward losses and causing knock-on issues for consumers, said Neil Parish, chair of the Environmental, Food and Rural Affairs Committee. In a letter to Home Secretary Priti Patel, he highlighted livestock stuck on farms due to meat-processing bottlenecks and lower chicken production closing some food outlets.

The committee set an initial Oct. 8 deadline for its inquiry and is seeking insight into issues including:

The outlook for labor shortages in the coming months and years.

What impact a timetable for physical checks at the border on food and live animal imports from the EU will have on current supply-chain problems.

Whether the government needs to take more action to support the food supply chain.

Food firms warn of panic-buying this Christmas

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Probably best not to speculate how this happened for fear of raising the ire of some sections of the rural establishment….This story tells us:

Food industry bodies have warned of panic-buying this Christmas unless action is taken to address labour shortages.

The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) called for an emergency visa to allow firms to recruit from outside the UK.

UK farmers, hauliers and shops have been struggling with shortages that have been made worse by Covid and Brexit.

The government said that the UK has a “highly resilient food supply chain”.

The head of the NFU, Minette Batters, wrote to Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday warning that the food and farming sector is on a “knife edge” due to a shortage of workers across the entire supply chain.

The letter, signed on behalf of a number of food and drink trade bodies, urged the government to introduce a Covid-19 recovery visa to open up new recruitment opportunities as a matter of urgency.

“Without it, more shelves will go empty and consumers will panic buy to try to get through the winter,” Ms Batters wrote.

“That is why we must have an urgent commitment from you to enable the industry to recruit from outside the UK over the next 12 months to get us through the winter and to help us save Christmas.”

UK worker shortage: Farmers give fruit and veg away for free

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Professor Tony Travers once said at a meeting I was at people would only truly understand the consequences of Brexit once the “rubber hit the road.” For some reason this story led me back to that fateful view. It tells us:

Farmers hit by a shortage of seasonal workers have resorted to giving produce away for free rather than seeing it left to rot.

York-based raspberry grower Richard Morritt threw his gates open to the public after failing to attract staff.

Others have done the same, and the National Farmers Union (NFU) has repeated calls for government help.

A government spokesperson said it was looking at ways to help the sector recruit more domestic labour.

Mr Morritt said in previous years the majority of his pickers came from eastern Europe.

In 2020, he had relied on furloughed workers and university students but this year he said “the shortage of labour has made it unviable”.

To stop the fruit going to waste he allowed members of the public to pick it for free.

Councils hit by bin collection delays due to driver shortage

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And here we go with the second Brexit fuelled labour shortage story. This article tells us of the impact of a shortage of drivers on a number of rural authorities tasked with emptying the bins! It tells us:

At least 18 councils across the UK confirmed on Thursday that they are experiencing ongoing disruptions to their bin collection services. 

It is due to staff self-isolating and a lack of heavy goods vehicle (HGV) drivers for bin lorries.

The Local Government Association (LGA) told the BBC that the delays were primarily affecting garden waste.

However, some councils are also delaying recycling collections in order to prioritise general waste. 

It comes as three councils in Devon wrote to Home Secretary Priti Patel on Thursday, asking for the government to grant temporary visas for trained European HGV drivers to ease the shortage.

“At the time of writing, North Devon Council are attempting to fill seven [bin lorry driver] vacancies, Torbay Council eight vacancies, and Teignbridge Council 10 vacancies,” wrote councillors Steve Darling, David Worden and Alistair Dewhirst. 

“This equates to approximately 20% of the HGV workforce in driver vacancies and it is proving very challenging to fill this resourcing gap given the dynamics of this labour market.” 

The UK currently has a shortfall of about 100,000 HGV drivers, after many EU workers returned home following Brexit and during the pandemic. 

Ministers say UK employers should hire locally to fill the gap, but the councils said it would take time to train the next generation of drivers. 

PM’s levelling up plan at risk of failure, warns ex-No 10 adviser

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There is a definite rural dimension to this levelling up agenda which has brought many rural towns in the context of initiatives such as the Towns Fund to the attention of regeneration funders who were previously completely uninclined to be interested in them. This article revealing a bit more about the dynamics underpinning the whole process is really interesting. It tells us:

Mr Tanner, a former adviser to Theresa May, has become an influential voice in Conservative circles after his Onward think tank identified the red wall seats in the run up to the last election. 

They were the once rock-solid Labour seats which fell into Conservative hands at the 2019 general election.

In a report shortly before the election, Mr Tanner described “Workington Man” – from the West Cumbrian constituency – as the sort of lifelong Labour voter who would switch to the Conservatives. 

This voter was pro-Brexit, sceptical of globalisation and wanted a government that would protect cherished local institutions such as pubs and post offices from closing.

In an interview with Newsnight ahead of the publication of his new report, Mr Tanner says: “Absolutely we came up with the Workington Man concept at the last election. We identified that as the archetypal voter that swung towards the Conservative party and delivered all those seats in the north of England – like Workington, like Walsall, like Warrington – those seats that the Conservative party had often never held before.

“It is precisely those seats that would benefit from a more localised approach, a bottom-up approach where communities take control of local assets like libraries and sports clubs and community hubs. Using them as the lynchpin for regeneration is likely to be successful in regenerating those local areas.” 

Newsnight visited Workington to gauge opinion about the government’s “levelling up” agenda. Some shoppers thought the government was too focused on larger metropolitan areas.

But Mike Johnson, the Conservative leader of the local Allerdale Borough Council, did not recognise the criticisms in the report.

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