YOUR correspondent last week seems to want to blame farmers for BSE.
As a farm girl in the late 70s I have to disagree. It is only in the last few years that commercial and scientific advances have been distrusted by the public, including farmers.
In the 1970s science was seen as a help to developing new and better food for animals and us.
A company that launched a product as a feed to make animals healthier, or increase the yield from cows was not treated with fear, it was welcomed.
Farmers are enduring the worst depression in their business in memory. In the last few years every sector of agriculture has been hit by crisis, and it is not fair, with hindsight, to blame farmers for a disease they could not have predicted.
If I was an MP who had been in Government during the failures to investigate the reports that were reaching them, I would feel a sense of shame. Those of us who want to represent our country in future Parliaments, myself and Hugh Pym included, have a duty to say so.
HELEN FRANCES
PPC for Devizes
Constituency
Liberal Democrat Office
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