Tomato Paperwork

[johnny2007]

It’s a wonder how many other countries in the world survive outside of the EU. Gosh, they must have it tough while everywhere in the EU is a bed of roses. It’s also a wonder so many of those well off EU residents want to live, study and work in the UK.

Yes, that's what I ask the majority of my compatriots who praise Italy and the EU and despise the Uk.
But they live here and have no intention to move

 

[carmanmemoranda]

One has to question the sanity of a person that says they have had enough of the UK and are going to leave….but don’t!

Troll

 

[Mottie]

Yes, that's what I ask the majority of my compatriots who praise Italy and the EU and despise the Uk.
But they live here and have no intention to move

Try free or subsidised housing, health care, education, benefits, social care etc etc.

 

[johnny2007]

Yes, that's what I ask the majority of my compatriots who praise Italy and the EU and despise the Uk.
But they live here and have no intention to move

Try free or subsidised housing, health care, education, benefits, social care etc etc.

You forgot wages and workers rights.

 

[Deleted member 174758]

Some blokes on tv said that there are thousands of acres of land in kent, covered by greenhouses in which they can grow whatever they want.
Why do we buy tomatoes and other veg from abroad then?

Until relatively recently we used to buy at least half our tomatoes grown under glass in Middlesborough. That operation originally started out by using excess heat from the rolling mills (steelworks) up there, but eventually moved to using gas heating.

Vegetables such as cucumbers used to come mainly from the Lee Valley, again gas heating was used to force the plants In winter months together with artificial light.

And we all know that at present gas prices are extremely high, that we live in a cold country and that in winter light levels are low - hence UK growers reducing or just stopping production (I've been told that in reality they only supplied about 40% of the market at most). Unlike most European governments ours has decided not to ihelp businesses with energy price caps (easily afforded with windfall taxes on the energy giants, as France gas done) which doesn"t help

 

[Odds]

All cobblers. This was the scene in Hornchurch High Street only yesterday….

View attachment 296786

Hornchurch holds a 'La Tomatina', too: who knew?

 

[Deleted member 174758]

You forgot wages and workers rights.

Don't worry about those. Once the EU Retained Laws Bill gets through you'll only have wages to worry about - because you'll lose all your employment rights. Better start learning to tug your forelock right now

 

[Odds]

We are capable of growing salad vegetables under glass in the UK all year around – not enough to meet supply, but certainly enough to deal with shortfalls. There are those who claim grandly that there’s something intrinsically distasteful and wrong about eating such foods out of season; that, as environment secretary Thérèse Coffey said last week, we should make do with turnips. That’s to misunderstand the history of agriculture. Humanity has been interfering with how and when crops grow since wild grasses were first domesticated on the banks of the Nile thousands of years ago. It’s called progress.

The problem is that growing salad vegetables in the UK has been made economically unviable, both by those shortsighted supermarkets and in large part by Brexit. Growers in the Lea Valley around London, regarded as Britain’s salad bowl, have started applying to knock down dozens of acres of greenhouses so the land can be used more profitably for houses. As the Lea Valley Growers Association has explained, the post-Brexit seasonal workers’ scheme only granted six-month visas when they were needed for nine months. It meant bringing in two cohorts and double the training. That means extra costs which are not being met by supermarkets.

Then came the energy crisis. The government chose not to subsidise the energy costs of growers. Last week APS group, one of the largest tomato growers in the country, admitted they had left some of their glasshouses unplanted for the first time in almost 75 years.

Some will argue that the supermarkets are refusing to pay more because they can’t pass on the costs to already hard-pressed consumers battling a cost of living crisis; that to suggest we should pay more for our food when so many are reduced to using food banks is a grossly insensitive argument made from a place of affluence. But if we structure our food system so that those in poverty can access it, we will only further damage our agricultural base. We need on the one hand to deal with the functioning of our food system and on the other with poverty, with a chronically unequal distribution of wealth. We need to stop talking about food poverty and just call it poverty.

And why is the UK not being supplied as once it was? Could it have something to do with getting trucks through borders mired in post-Brexit paperwork? Dutch lorry drivers complained last week on social media about border checks adding hours to their shifts. Far easier, then, to get stock to supermarkets across a borderless Schengen zone.

This is the problem with running down British agriculture and depending on imports. In 2006 Labour published a paper on food security nicknamed in food circles the “leave it to Tesco” report because it argued that in a globalised world a rich UK could buy its way out of any supply issues. It failed to recognise the growing dominance of emerging economies like India and China, which were buying the crops we wanted. But at least we had the EU and the ease of supply. And then we left it.

Jay Rayner@theGraunida

 

[carmanmemoranda]

We are capable of growing salad vegetables under glass in the UK all year around – not enough to meet supply, but certainly enough to deal with shortfalls. There are those who claim grandly that there’s something intrinsically distasteful and wrong about eating such foods out of season; that, as environment secretary Thérèse Coffey said last week, we should make do with turnips. That’s to misunderstand the history of agriculture. Humanity has been interfering with how and when crops grow since wild grasses were first domesticated on the banks of the Nile thousands of years ago. It’s called progress.

The problem is that growing salad vegetables in the UK has been made economically unviable, both by those shortsighted supermarkets and in large part by Brexit. Growers in the Lea Valley around London, regarded as Britain’s salad bowl, have started applying to knock down dozens of acres of greenhouses so the land can be used more profitably for houses. As the Lea Valley Growers Association has explained, the post-Brexit seasonal workers’ scheme only granted six-month visas when they were needed for nine months. It meant bringing in two cohorts and double the training. That means extra costs which are not being met by supermarkets.

Then came the energy crisis. The government chose not to subsidise the energy costs of growers. Last week APS group, one of the largest tomato growers in the country, admitted they had left some of their glasshouses unplanted for the first time in almost 75 years.

Some will argue that the supermarkets are refusing to pay more because they can’t pass on the costs to already hard-pressed consumers battling a cost of living crisis; that to suggest we should pay more for our food when so many are reduced to using food banks is a grossly insensitive argument made from a place of affluence. But if we structure our food system so that those in poverty can access it, we will only further damage our agricultural base. We need on the one hand to deal with the functioning of our food system and on the other with poverty, with a chronically unequal distribution of wealth. We need to stop talking about food poverty and just call it poverty.

And why is the UK not being supplied as once it was? Could it have something to do with getting trucks through borders mired in post-Brexit paperwork? Dutch lorry drivers complained last week on social media about border checks adding hours to their shifts. Far easier, then, to get stock to supermarkets across a borderless Schengen zone.

This is the problem with running down British agriculture and depending on imports. In 2006 Labour published a paper on food security nicknamed in food circles the “leave it to Tesco” report because it argued that in a globalised world a rich UK could buy its way out of any supply issues. It failed to recognise the growing dominance of emerging economies like India and China, which were buying the crops we wanted. But at least we had the EU and the ease of supply. And then we left it.

Jay Rayner@theGraunida

Best, most balanced comment I've read for ages

 

[johnny2007]

Don't worry about those. Once the EU Retained Laws Bill gets through you'll only have wages to worry about - because you'll lose all your employment rights. Better start learning to tug your forelock right now

They won't be able to cut wages.
Uk has always had higher wages and better working conditions that many European countries.
Before, during and after the EU.
I agree that we don't know what the future holds, but looking at historical data, it is unlikely that workers will be paid €3/hour or less like in the beloved continent.

 

[carmanmemoranda]

They won't be able to cut wages.
Uk has always had higher wages and better working conditions that many European countries.
Before, during and after the EU.
I agree that we don't know what the future holds, but looking at historical data, it is unlikely that workers will be paid €3/hour or less like in the beloved continent.

wages are only relevant to the cost of living.

£x per hour means nothing on its own

better working conditions is an interesting claim

 

[gant]

Don't worry about those. Once the EU Retained Laws Bill gets through you'll only have wages to worry about - because you'll lose all your employment rights. Better start learning to tug your forelock right now

You mean all those rights that made workers unemployable, where you cant sack people so the labour force moved to self employment and zero hours contracts.
Smart move for the workers eh.

 

[Odds]

Best, most balanced comment I've read for ages

And i can't even take any credit for it.

I don't often read Jay Rayner's restaurant reviews but his view on the current shortages in shops is a pearler.
Hard to believe anyone in the business would've left greenhouses unplanted over winter, but we live in strange days.

 

[gant]

And i can't even take any credit for it.

I don't often read Jay Rayner's restaurant reviews but his view on the current shortages in shops is a pearler.
Hard to believe anyone in the business would've left greenhouses unplanted over winter, but we live in strange days.

Preparation for nett zero.

 

[carmanmemoranda]

You mean all those rights that made workers unemployable, where you cant sack people so the labour force moved to self employment and zero hours contracts.
Smart move for the workers eh.

tugging your forelock ?