Leader of the Welsh Conservatives and Clwyd West MS Darren Millar met with North Wales farmers last week to discuss the challenges they are currently facing.
The meeting took place at Llŷr Jones’ farm, Derwydd, in Llanfihangel Glyn Myfyr newr Corwen and was attended by NFU Cymru Clwyd members.
Llŷr was instrumental in organising a display of 5,500 wellington boots on the Senedd steps in March 2024, protesting against the Welsh Government's proposed new farming scheme.
He runs a closed flock of 1,100 ewes, buys around 250 dairy heifers a year, and runs a 32,000 free range egg unit, selling the eggs to Tesco.
Welsh farmers are currently facing a number of challenges and Darren was pleased to have the opportunity to discuss these with Llŷr and other NFU Cymru Clwyd members.
Speaking after the meeting, he said:
“The life of a farmer has never been an easy one, however, currently farmers in Wales are facing more challenges than ever before.
“I was therefore extremely pleased to meet with these local farmers and to hear first-hand of some of the issues they are facing.
“These include the detrimental impact of the 'farming-by-calendar' approach; Westminster funding for agriculture being moved into the Barnett Formula rather than being kept separate which reduces it to from 9% to 5%; Labour's new Family Farm Tax; poor mobile signal in certain areas; and Green energy efforts reducing food production in Wales, whilst countries overseas are not following the same green energy legislation.
“They told me that there is a lot of uncertainty which is making farmers reluctant to make investments.
“The meeting was extremely useful, and I will certainly be continuing to champion Welsh farmers and agriculture, and raising these matters with the Welsh Government.”
NFU Cymru county chairman, David Williams, said:
"I’m grateful to Darren for joining us at Derwydd and to Llŷr for hosting.
"It’s been useful to have this exchange of views with Darren and I am sure he has also learnt a bit more about some of the issues we are facing as a sector.
"As leader of the opposition at the Senedd, I very much hope that he and his team in the Welsh Conservatives will continue with the important work of scrutinising the work of the Welsh Government to help ensure we have the best possible policies in place to support the agricultural sector.”
