Country life
It never rains . . .
Leanda de Lisle
First we hear of an outbreak of footand-mouth disease, an almost mythical plague that few have seen in their adult lifetime. Then the Animal Liberation Front announces that the homes of countryside marchers are 'legitimate targets'. Finally, the Alliance's March is cancelled. You can see why whispers of plots and sabotage are drifting out of the countryside along with the disease carried on the spring breeze.
The immediate impact of the outbreak in this house was that my husband couldn't hunt last Saturday. Hardly a tragedy, but the week-long ban on hunting has now been extended without limit and that matters a great deal locally. The Atherstone hunt isn't a rich pack and it relies on having a longer season than most to pick up much needed extra business when its grander sisters close down — business that won't be materialising this year. On the farm we are fortunate — if it can be considered fortunate to have had to close down our outdoor pig unit and make the pig man redundant — to be entirely arable.
But my brother-in-law is a cattleman. Over the past few years he has built up a fine organic herd of rare Long Horn cattle. If foot-and-mouth reaches the Long Horns and they have to be put down, the herd, which is now one of the biggest in England, can never be replaced. My father-in-law has tried to make a germ barrier to protect them with some old carpet he found in his storerooms. It has been cut into strips, soaked with disinfectant and laid across the farm's roads. I hope this will be enough to keep disease out.
When I spoke to my brother-in-law last week he said that under the circumstances it seemed likely that the Countryside March would be cancelled. I had just organised for our vegetarian gardener to house-sit for us on the 18th and mental pictures of her bombarding an ALF army with brussels sprouts filled my mind. His suggestion seemed unreal.
However, by the end of last week even men like Ken Livingstone were saying cancelling the March was the only responsible thing to do. On Monday morning I telephoned the Alliance to ask them what their revised plans for the March were. The press officer told me that those who didn't live near farms would still be welcome on Sunday 18th. It must have been hard to accept so much hard work had been done and so much money spent in vain — still more so when men like Livingstone were gloating over the possible cancellation. But by lunchtime the big honchos at the Alliance had accepted the inevitable and announced the postponement of the March. Back in the sticks this all seemed just a little too convenient for the animal rights brigade who had threatened our homes.
Although it seems improbable that anyone who cares about animals should deliberately let them out to give them an infectious disease that would end in mass slaughter, country people have seen selfproclaimed animal lovers deliberately scare horses and lead hounds onto railway lines. All animals are equal to groups like the ALF, but some are more equal than others.
However the truth is somehow sadder than this disaster all being down to a bunch of mad, twisted terrorists. The root cause is indifference, principally that of a farmer in Northumberland, but also shown by our Parliamentary representatives. They sat back while our small abattoirs were regulated out of existence, leaving animals to travel long distances to be slaughtered and thereby creating ideal conditions for the spreading of disease. And now they will sit back some more. Doesn't it already seem that in the countryside it's just one damn thing after another.
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