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The Environmental Campaigner accused the NFU of taking a ’cynical and opportunistic’ approach to rule changes

Environmental campaigner George Monbiot has accused the NFU of being ‘opportunistic and cynical’ following changes to muckspreading rules in light of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

As reported in Farmers Guardian, the Government announced measures to help with fertiliser costs after prices skyrocketed on the back of the war.

But speaking on the Jeremy Vine Show on BBC Radio 2 this week (April 5), Mr Monbiot questioned the motives of the union, claiming it was opportunistic and ‘nothing to do with the fertiliser shortage’.

“Muck spreading in the autumn means rain is going to wash it off the fields and into the rivers,” he said.

“It wastes fertility. It does not save it. It just washes fertility into the rivers.”

He said farmers had been lobbying for the changes previously and the Ukrainian conflict was being used as a ‘new excuse’.

He suggested the problem was down to planning permission being granted to large livestock farms which then needed to ‘get rid of’ slurry.

Wrong

Farmer Sam from North Yorkshire, who also spoke on programme, refuted Mr Monbiot’s claims and added the changes meant the rules were ‘more realistic’.

He added for water quality people should be more concerned about sewage being leaked into rivers, ‘rather than about a tweak’ to the spreading window.

Farmers also reacted angrily to Mr Monbiot’s claims online, with Somerset farmer Richard Payne tweeting to ask ‘how an educated man’ could get it so wrong.

He highlighted farmyard manure was a ‘valuable commodity’ so farmers did not want to waste it.

He added there were bad eggs in every industry but Monbiot’s claims farmers did not take care with spreading were ‘incorrect and unhelpful’.