MONDAY: #AgricultureBill is back in the Commons.

Most MPs are well-intentioned & #BackBritishFarming, but the truth is, unless standards are enshrined in law, there is a high probability risk farming will be undermined. . @Keir_Starmer understands this.

#SaveBritishFarming
. @trussliz thinks it& #39;s worth undermining our food, farming, animal welfare, countryside & Enviro standards to get trade deals, but has she weighed up the trade-offs? Trade deals gains are tiny compared to losses from trashing our standards —not just £ losses.

#SaveBritishFarming
Losses from trashing our food, farming & environmental standards are not limited to the 25-50% of British farms DEFRA expects to go bust.

There& #39;ll also be massive costs to public health (those who suffer + the #NHS) from food produced by methods banned here.

#SaveBritishFarming
To take USA for example:
-animals are reared in ways we could consider cruel, and which are forbidden here #SowStalls
-animals are pumped full of antibiotics (contributing to antibiotic resistance in humans), estimated 3x UK use
-livestock given growth hormones

#SaveOurStandards
Chickens have to be washed in chlorine because farming standards in the USA —from the conditions eggs are laid in, to those chicks hatch in & chickens are reared in, until ready for slaughter— are much lower than ours.

Chlorination masks low #AnimalWelfare.
#SaveBritishFarming
Shanker Singham, an Anglo-US trade lawyer from the #Legatum #DisasterCapitalist stable, is Gove&Cummings& #39;s guru on trade and, with an IEA colleague, has been appointed to the Commission to advise Truss on trade deal impact on standards - a fox in the hen coop.
#SaveBritishFarming
Singham claims chlorine-washed chicken is higher quality than UK chicken, but the evidence doesn& #39;t bare this out.

Food poisoning is 8-10x greater in the US than in the UK.

Southampton Uni found that chlorine washes mask the presence of salmonella.

#SaveBritishFarming
It& #39;s not just farms going bust, or increased costs to ourselves & #NHS from poor quality food (which won& #39;t necessarily be cheaper, BTW), or the moral cost of UK consumers subsidising low animal welfare, there will also be a negative impact on our countryside.

#SaveBritishFarming
Our beautiful countryside doesn& #39;t get that way by accident, or *nature* alone.

Our countryside is beautiful because farmers, who take care of 71% of the UK& #39;s land, work hard to maintain our countryside, while producing high quality food for our plates.

#SaveBritishFarming
. @LizTruss says undermine British farmers to allow more imports from farms in developing countries. This is disingenuous:
a)she& #39;s only ever talked up FTAs with developed countries
b)47 developing countries lose EBA tariff/quota-free access to UK due to Brexit

#SaveBritishFarming
In economic terms, trade deal yield is paltry compared to costs of lower standards: farms going bust, health impacts + environmental damage. Returns range from 0% on NZ FTA to +0.07-0.16% GDP in 15yrs on US FTA. Meanwhile cost to #NHS more than wipe them out.
#SaveBritishFarming
Does #GlobalBritain = punishing UK farmers for all the hard work they& #39;ve done to raise standards to world-beating levels, after the mad cow disease disaster, by undermining them thru trade deals that open UK to low-animal-welfare/ high-pollution-produced food?
#SaveBritishFarming
Also, could . @AlokSharma_RDG explain how undermining our #FarmToFork strategy of high standards sits with our environmental commitments, and particularly with our supposed leadership in these policies for #COP26 #Glasgow?
#COP26 rightly focuses on reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, but we shouldn& #39;t off-set environmental gains we make from this source with losses we incur by trashing our agricultural sector through the de facto subsidisation of lower standards thru FTAs.

#SaveBritishFarming
Besides public health hazards, harm to animals & environmental damage, there& #39;s another compelling reason for MPs to enshrine our high food, farming, animal welfare, countryside & environmental standards in law:

It& #39;s *the Will of the People*

#SaveBritishFarming #SaveOurStandards
If you& #39;re still not convinced, imagine in your mind& #39;s eye our green & pleasant land, with livestock dotted here & there, roaming free, munching on the verdant grass...

Then watch this clip of a typical US cattle farm. This is where lowering standards takes us. #SaveOurStandards
Yes, I know you& #39;re cross that 53% of Farmers believed Brexit lies and that you saw VoteLeave signs up in their fields & #39;cos the Remain campaign didn& #39;t engage with farmers and issue them with signs, but write to your MP to stop this crap ending up on YOUR plate.

#SaveOurStandards
And yes, I also know that your MP might be a hopeless case, that you never get satisfactory answers from them — if they bother to answer at all.

BUT WRITE ANYWAY. The contents of their postbag matters, and even if they disagree with you, they take note.

#SaveOurStandards
And if you made it this far and you& #39;ve now resolved to write to your MP to #SaveOurStandards and/or #SaveBritishFarming

—THANK YOU https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😊" title="LĂ€chelndes Gesicht mit lĂ€chelnden Augen" aria-label="Emoji: LĂ€chelndes Gesicht mit lĂ€chelnden Augen">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🚜" title="Traktor" aria-label="Emoji: Traktor">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐄" title="Kuh" aria-label="Emoji: Kuh">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐖" title="Schwein" aria-label="Emoji: Schwein">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐑" title="Schaf" aria-label="Emoji: Schaf">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐏" title="Bock" aria-label="Emoji: Bock">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐔" title="Huhn" aria-label="Emoji: Huhn">
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