Jamie Blackett

Jamie Blackett is a dairy farmer in Galloway.

Friday

Jamie Blackett

Illegal rewilders are taking over the countryside

From our UK edition

Hardly a month goes by without a report of guerrilla rewilders at work. Lynx released in the Cairngorms, wild boar on Dartmoor, beavers everywhere and, no doubt, before long, wolves and bears – if neo-Rousseauist guerrillas can find a ready supply and achieve it without being bitten.  Usually, these illegal releases of formerly indigenous-but-no-longer-native animals are in national parks, reinforcing my view that national parks give people a state-sponsored sense of entitlement to behave as they please on private land. The fact that the vast majority of farmers are against such reintroductions seems to give added incentive to the rewilding guerrillas. The extinction of family farms at the hands of Rachel from Customer Complaints is bad enough.

Monday

Jamie Blackett

Britain’s farmers could revolt

From our UK edition

Historians may already be pinching themselves in disbelief. It is looking as though Starmer's government may be being pitched into a full-scale crisis by picking on… millionaire farmers. It turns out that outside North London the country is not as driven by spite and envy as Rachel Reeves appears to think. And the stereotype of a farmer as a rich git in a Range Rover is rapidly being debunked as a succession of authentic yokels who are asset rich but cash poor appear on our screens. They thought they were going after Sir James Dyson and have found themselves facing people like Gareth Wyn Jones.

Thursday

Jamie Blackett

Labour’s farm tax makes no sense

From our UK edition

Amid the furore over Lord Alli’s contributions to Lady Starmer’s wardrobe the new environment secretary, Steve Reed, was able to stay under the radar. Most of us weren’t aware that he had been schmoozing his way around British farms during the election campaign wearing brand new, top of the range Le Chameau wellies – also apparently gifted by the ubiquitous Lord Alli. At the time Reed was promising that Labour had no intention of changing Agricultural Property Relief. In fact, responding to an accusation by his Tory opponent, Steve Barclay, he dismissed it as ‘desperate nonsense’.

Saturday

Jamie Blackett

Spectator Out Loud: Robert Tombs, Jamie Blackett and Tanya Gold

From our UK edition

22 min listen

This episode of Spectator Out Loud features Professor Robert Tombs on Canada's willingness to believe anything bad about its own history (00:55); the farmer Jamie Blackett on the harms of wild camping (12:10); and Tanya Gold on the reopening of Claridge's Restaurant. Presented and produced by Cindy Yu.

Wednesday

Jamie Blackett

The trouble with wild campers

From our UK edition

It’s not just bears that squat in the woods, as you’ll discover if you ever have the pleasure of a visit from wild campers. Other disfigurements to the land have included scorched patches of grass, which luckily didn’t become full-blown wildfires, branches severed from trees (presumably for wet firewood), stakes removed from young saplings (ditto), and the inevitable beer can and ‘disposable’ barbecue pyramid. I recently found a lacy, magenta-coloured bodice hanging from a tree, but that may have been left by an even wilder breed of camper.

Saturday

Jamie Blackett

In defence of George Galloway

From our UK edition

Last week was a long time in politics for my running mate in the Scottish elections, George Galloway. It started with a YouGov poll finding that George is the best known opposition leader in Scotland and the one that voters in several regions think would provide the strongest opposition to the SNP. We used that as the springboard for our Covid ‘Potemkin rallies’, where George announces from his soapbox that he will be ‘holding his nose and voting Tory’ as tactical voting is the only way to defeat the SNP. If Scottish Tories were grateful for the endorsement of Scotland’s best known left-winger, they had a funny way of showing it.

Thursday

Jamie Blackett

How George Galloway and I plan to save the Union

From our UK edition

For me – and, I suspect, for many Scottish Tories – a lot of my time in lockdown was characterised by a sense of frustrated impotence. I would sit in front of the television in furious disbelief as I watched Nicola Sturgeon, the unchallenged leader of a one-party state, on the BBC, answering useless questions from selected journalists who offered no supplementary interrogation. As Sturgeon’s poll ratings soared my morale sank. What are we dejected Unionists to do? How can we stop the SNP’s march towards a second referendum when the mainstream opposition to Sturgeon from the Scottish branch offices of the Tory, Labour and Liberal parties has been risible? Then three weeks ago George Galloway came to lunch.

Saturday

Jamie Blackett

Beware the rise of US beef

From our UK edition

‘Oh man, US farmers would never put up with all this crap!’ said the young American cowgirl. She was doing an internship on my farm last year and was shocked that we have to tag all our animals at birth and then record every antibiotic administered throughout their lives to ensure the complete traceability of British beef. I remember the look of incredulity on her face as I pointed out the grey hairs on my head caused by mislaid cow passports. This cultural difference between the two countries is partly why a US-UK trade deal isn't straightforward. Last month, parliament voted down an amendment to the Agriculture Bill, tabled by Neil Parish, the Conservative MP for Tiverton and Honiton, to safeguard food standards.

Tuesday

Jamie Blackett

Will coronavirus mean we finally begin to appreciate farmers?

From our UK edition

Here in the Scottish countryside the labour force is creaking. A big dairy farmer nearby was relying on nine Irish students for calving – all nine went back to Ireland a few days ago to avoid the lockdown. The heroes of the countryside are the septuagenarians on family farms who have voluntarily broken self-isolation to maintain the flow of milk to the nation’s breakfast tables. Social distancing is something that comes naturally to us bumpkins, but it has to be ignored when push comes to shove. Have you ever tried cramming a prolapsed uterus back into a heifer with three people standing two metres apart? Meanwhile the key worker policy is a shambles in Scotland. Holyrood ducked the issue and delegated it to local councils, which has only created confusion.

Thursday

Jamie Blackett

Our tree-planting obsession may do more harm than good

From our UK edition

‘Four beef burgers is the same as flying to New York and back! FOUR BURGERS!’ When I arrived at the Extinction Rebellion demo, the first person I met was a woman activist, clad from head to foot in ocean-polluting, synthetic fibres, talking absolute nonsense. And because I’m a beef farmer, I felt I should set her straight. I explained that no, my grass-fed beef does not harm the planet, and asked her what on earth she expected the farmers of Britain to do if they couldn’t keep cows. ‘Ah,’ she says, folding her arms, ‘they should just grow trees.’ Trees are fast becoming the answer to everything. Worried about floods? Don’t bother dredging rivers, just plant forests. Anxious about the effect on the environment of flying?