A free-market view on the sugar row
I think, and shoot me down in flames if I am wrong, British conservatism is being a bit less coherent and up-front about the G8 agenda than its counterpart in the USA - so I asked Alex Singleton (pictured) to pen me a response to the report on the EU sugar subsidy...
Alex is president of the Globalisation Institute, a UK think tank. Unlike me, Alex has made it to the "enemy" section of UK Indymedia and formerly was research supremo at the Adam Smith Institute. He writes:
"It's easy to regard conservatives as one homogenous group. In fact, but there is are two quite different perspectives at work. There are those who wear Barbour jackets and go on Countryside Alliance marches. And there are the slicker, cosmopolitan free-marketeers who have always opposed agricultural spending, believing that if other countries can produce more cheaply, Britain should let them.
"The Barbour-owners are the modern-day equivalent of the Tory aristocracy who, in the 19th Century, supported the Corn Laws. The Corn Laws were great for land-owners but were causing causing starvation among the poor. Eventually, the free-traders got their way and Sir Robert Peel repealed protection in 1846.
"So what can a government wanting to repeal the CAP do to bring the Barbour-owners on side? In the 1980s, the free-marketeers mastered the technique of paying off special interests. It may be prudent to give farmers a one-off payment in exchange for never receiving subsidies again."
I can see "Barbour owners" as a kind of walk-on Greek chorus in 100% Brigadoon.
UPDATE: Responding to this, viewer Michelle Berry adds via email:
"The fuss over CAP tarriffs have as the aim to allow agribusiness to set up shop in Africa and re-export food products into Europe. Just like Asia is becoming the manufacturing workshop of the world so Africa is to become the food shop of the world. To what extent that will lead to an alleviation of poverty is based on ones belief that globalism in all its forms is progressive and social inequalities fall, instead of rising as they have been doing over the last decade and a half."
