Nobody works harder or longer than farmers

Does this person think that farmers are protesting at this level for fun?

Lyn Jenkins Gwbert, Cardigan

ISN’T it rich that a writer who does not have the guts to allow his name and address to be published can make such a vitriolic attack on Welsh farmers (“Farmers pleading poverty is a bit rich”, Letters, March 16)?

“Name and address supplied” says: “The loss of 20% of farmland by having 10% woodland and 10% conservation is total hogwash as most farms already contain more than 10% woodland.” No they don’t!

Whilst some farms have some trees, most have nothing like 10%! I know plenty of farms with hardly any trees. We only have a handful of willows, one of the smallest of trees. Trees won’t even grow on coastal farms.

The spin-off to rural communities from agriculture is phenomenal – cut farm production 20% and you will cut the whole economy of most of Wales by about 20%!

Does this person think that farmers are protesting at this level for fun? He should know that these are the main wealth-creators of most of Wales. They work seven days a week, mainly for far longer than a mere eight-hour day. In doing so, they are financing Cardiff Bay with their short five-day week (if that) and umpteen weeks a year shut-down. Why the long shutdowns? Where’s the logic?

I know one dairy farmer who did not miss a single milking for 26 years. Got that? Twenty-six years, start to finish, morning and evening. Every single day, every weekend, every Christmas. No day off ever, no holiday ever. Two milkings alone is around six hours a day, with feeding, mucking out, washing down etc. You don’t have a clue.

As for tractors, they are the farmer’s essential expensive working tools, just as a car is to a rep and a lorry is to a haulier!

You are the one talking hogwash, Mr Coward! I wonder how hard you work?

Lyn Jenkins, Gwbert, Cardigan

Failing to learn the lessons of the past

AT A Coronation lunch in Westminster Hall during May 1953, Sir Winston Churchill advised: “Study history. Study history.”

These are wise words that Dr Jonathan F Dean, of Llanerchymedd, should heed when he recommends the Oldbury site on the River Severn for a nuclear power station (Letters, March 8). The history of the nuclear generation industry since Calder Hall should fill him with dread and not surprisingly, the new grossly expensive Hinkley Point Nuclear Power Plant is heading for £30bn and being far behind schedule.

History and knowledge will tell Dr Dean that the Somerset coastline, where this nuclear plant is being built, experiences the second highest tidal range on the planet, and has experienced vast flooding in the past, drowning many animals and people, coupled with flooding on the opposite Welsh coastline between Cardiff and Newport.

Regarding base load power requirement, nuclear fission should be avoided as it is a horrendously expensive, dirty and a dangerous strategy, especially when there are other viable, safer and cleaner options available.

He is foolish to champion wind generation when even the dimmest in the class will tell him that without the correct wind, no useful electricity will be generated – in other words they are completely at the mercy of the weather – so much for security of supply, for without full and adequate backup disaster awaits our electricity dependent society. Regarding offshore wind he appears to be totally unaware of storms at sea and the high cost of maintenance – even when the weather allows a landing.

Dr Dean must think we are all very naive and gullible – especially when power bills have more than doubled – but someone has to pay for large scale wind and solar generation, and in particular, the cerebral challenging payments to Scottish wind farms of hundreds of millions when they are NOT producing any electricity under the generous Constraints Policy.

Finally, I would also advise Dr Dean to acquaint himself with Aldous Huxley, the English writer and philosopher, who wrote: “That men do not learn the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach us.”

Dave Haskell

Brithdir, Cardigan

Speaking language of our oppressors

I’M not happy with our new First Minister.

We are living as one of the most unique people in the world, and that uniqueness comes from Cymraeg.

How can Gething be so insensitive as to seek to speak to the Cymry in a language which has oppressed them and attempted to destroy their culture?

Rhian Hewitt-Davies

By email

Endangered species lurking on the web

AS EACH week passes with yet another Tory disaster and the long awaited chance to consign them to opposition for a generation through the forthcoming General Election, I read the daily Webchat slot in the South Wales Echo with increasing amazement.

Who are these people who frequent this area of the web? Are they the last Tories in Wales, all 20 of them?

David Hutchings

Newport

All Labour offers are more handouts

WHY do Labour want to go back to issues of the 1970s/‘80s with their wish to invite inflation, through advocating state handouts to Welsh workers?

All Labour provide is wage inflation without efficiency, keen for the state to run everything instead of highlighting areas where the market is a far better barometer.

This is true for public transport, where under Labour in the ‘80s council bus companies went bust when competing on a level playing field with private sector bus operators; the Cardiff Airport which almost went bust, needing £50m+ to stop its closure, then £40+m a year subsidy; and new trains where our infrastructure is so far behind new trains arrive having to to be parked up at Barry Dock. They now wish to establish Transport for Wales 100%, using the same council infrastruture from the past.

Welsh people are historically hardworking, but Labour prefer a handout society where the poor believe Labour are the party for workers, not just the handout benefits party. Plaid Cymru need to appreciate Cardiff Bay will always be the key for Labour’s domination.

Plaid should give Labour due notice to stop the political accommodation. If Labour can’t get their Westminster leader to agree a refund to Wales of HS2 English expenditure funded by Wales, what else will they expect us to take if in control at Westminster? With a large Labour majority in the next UK election, we will continue as second class citizens.

Mark Drakford comes from a Labour background where academics and professional politicians keep the Welsh people under Westminster political control. Now we have Vaughan Gething as First Minister, totally 100% committed to Labour first, instead of Wales first.

Clayton Jones Ynysybwl