'The most cynical political move I have seen in quite some time': Prominent Ulster farmer's view on Rishi Sunak's 'meat tax axe'

Whilst the announcement was likely designed to curry favour with farmers, Ray Elkin said he is unconvinced that the Tory government is really on their side.

Mr Elkin is a beef farmer who was formerly chairman of both the UFU's Co Tyrone and Beef and Sheep sections.

Some in Mr Sunak's party have said that the meat tax and a handful of other environmental proposals he has now thrown out had never been credible to begin with, opening him up to the criticism that he is trying to earn kudos for shooting down proposals which were never going to fly anyway.

Mr Elkin told the News Letter: "I firmly believe it never was going to happen.

"It's purely politics to 'rule out' something that you were never going to do in the first place.

"The vast majority of his electorate – indeed the population – are meat-eaters, so why would they suddenly want to start to pay tax on it?

"It's the most cynical thing I've heard for quite some time from anybody.

"Realistically it was never going to happen: they were not going to make some announcement to create some tax for the vast majority of people whose votes they're looking for.

"I'm not sure they [the Tories] are friends of the working farmer, because they brought in tariff-free agri produce from Australia and New Zealand."

This is a reference to a policy which kicked in on June 1 this year, reducing tariffs on some imported Australasian products like honey, nuts, and rice to zero, while gradually phasing out tariffs on meat and dairy imports.

"Every government policy that's out there is to get themselves elected," said Mr Elkin.

"And having cheap food is one of the big things - they're wanting food as cheap as it can, and don't care where it comes from."

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