Opinion: BPS advance is small compensation, Mr Eustice

Defra secretary George Eustice wrote to me personally this week with news that he has decided to bring forward payment of part of my Basic Payment Scheme (BPS) money for 2022.

I thought I should write him a reply:

About the author

Stephen Carr

Farmers Weekly Opinion writer

Stephen Carr runs an 800ha beef, sheep and arable farm on the South Downs near Eastbourne in Sussex in partnership with his wife and four of his daughters. He also runs a nearby pub with his nephew, The Sussex Ox, which serves the farm’s beef, lamb, (and fruit and vegetables from the farmhouse kitchen-garden in season) through its restaurant.

Read more articles by Stephen Carr

Windy Hill Farm
Flint Acre
Drought Prone
East Sussex

Dear Mr Eustice,

Many thanks for your letter informing me that I can expect half of my BPS annual claim to be paid earlier than in previous years.

Given the cost price squeeze that a predominantly beef and sheep farm like mine has been under for the past 18 months, this earlier part-payment will be most welcome. 

If your letter was a little short, I quite understand, as you’ve got a lot on your plate at the moment.

So much so, for example, that nearly 17 months after Great Britain (the UK, excluding Northern Ireland) finally withdrew from the EU’s single market and customs union, you still haven’t managed to find the time to get border checks in place for food imported into GB from the EU.

And that’s even though the EU implemented its border checks on food exports from GB from day one…

Brief as your letter was, I quite liked your paragraph about why you’d decided to bring forward my BPS payment.

You explained that the rise in ammonium nitrate, tractor diesel and electricity prices has put “an increased pressure on cashflow in the short term”. 

I say I “quite liked” that paragraph, because I’m not sure why you think the pressure on my cashflow will be “short term”.

Have you not seen the latest interim agricultural inflation figures from AF, the UK’s largest farmer-owned buying co-operative?

AF is owned by 3,000 farmer members and, even though it prides itself on using its collective purchasing power to drive a hard bargain, in just the past six months its farming inputs price index has increased by 23.28%, on top of a 22% increase in the previous 12 months to September 2021. 

Yes, that’s right, Mr Eustice, over the past 18 months I have seen my beef and lamb production costs escalate by 45%.

Over the same period, my farmgate beef and lamb prices have risen, but by barely half that much. 

Which brings me to the last paragraph of your letter, where you make the point that your BPS decision “wouldn’t have been possible under the EU”. 

Well, as you insist on raising the UK’s recent loss of EU membership… were the UK still a member, you wouldn’t have been able to cut my BPS by 25% already, and propose to abolish it entirely by 2027. 

Nor, had the UK still been a member of the EU, would the government of which you are a minister have been free to sign free-trade deals with Australia and New Zealand that threaten to undercut beef and sheep farmers in Great Britain, both in terms of farmgate prices and animal welfare standards. 

I’m sorry if my letter does not sound more grateful, but I think it’s important that, as the man in charge of my industry, you are properly informed of the reality of producing beef and lamb in Great Britain.  

Kind regards,

Stephen Carr