The Rural Bulletin: 21 December 2017

BT rural broadband offer rejected

BT’s £600m offer to provide superfast broadband to rural homes in the UK has been rejected by the Government.

The voluntary offer, which promised to connect 1.1m homes to superfast broadband, has been thrown out in favour of giving homeowners the legal right to demand an upgrade from their providers by 2020.

According to recent report by Ofcom, about 17% of rural homes and businesses are not benefiting from reliable broadband services, compared with just 2% in urban areas.

Farm support limits to be announced in January

Capping of farm support payments is to be one of the first major changes post Brexit, Defra secretary Michael Gove has announced.

A Defra paper will be published next month, detailing how the Government will introduce the cap, limiting the amount of payments received by larger farms.

In a report by Farmers Weekly, Mr Gove said: “Simply paying people on the size of their land holding is wrong. We intend to cap the amount that goes to people and to redistribute some of that sum, so it is spent on public goods – including improving productivity and environmental enhancement.”

New water abstraction plans revealed

Plans to restrict water abstraction for agriculture in order to protect the environment have been revealed by government this week.

The proposals should end damaging abstraction of water from rivers and groundwater wherever it is cost-effective to do so – while improving access to water where it is needed the most. 

Environment minister, Thérèse Coffey said: “The abstraction licensing system is in clear need of reform and I am very pleased to set out how we will do this in our plan. I believe our approach will work for all parties and, most importantly, will protect our precious water supplies.”

The NFU says it supports the reform, but is seeking reassurance that upheaval caused by major rule changes will be kept to a minimum. 

Pressure to review badger cull policy builds

Michael Gove has come under pressure from animal welfare groups to review the current badger cull policy – however, the NFU has argued it is successful in reducing TB.

The results of the autumn cull are expected to be released later this week, alongside updates on current TB testing regimes. However, the Badger Trust has argued that culling has done little to reduce TB rates in cattle and has instead led to the slaughter of 40,000 badgers – costing taxpayers more than £40m.

The NFU responded, saying the testing of roadkill badgers in Cheshire has shown at least 25% of badgers are infected and that culling has been done effectively and humanely.