Roofs & Rambles

I have habit of reading any newspaper I find, whether it be liberal, right wing or damn right tabloid. As ever the Guardian’s George Monbiot rails against the injustices of the UK planning system. Tesco’s is about to invade his town Machynlleth. He could be accused of ‘dawn’ right nimbyism by his detractors – and there are many of those. Whatever the rights and wrongs of his diatribe he notes that:

‘Tesco maintains that it will buy local produce “wherever possible”. But when its representatives were challenged on this point, they said that local suppliers would have to sell their produce to the company as a whole. It would be trucked to the nearest distribution centre – now 120 miles away in Avonmouth – and then trucked back across Wales to Machynlleth.’

An interesting point when you consider two articles in the Daily Telegraph I managed to read on the train back form London. Kate Colquhon’s article ‘How secure is our food? discusses DEFRA’s Food Security Assessment. She of course mentions the European CAP, a bete noire of the right [even though some of the largest landowners suck up most of the money from the EU’. However the accompanying article,by Tim Lang – A farming revolution - notes that:

‘Food accounts for one in four lorry movements on British roads; half of those trips are empty.’

It is interesting to note that both a liberal and right wing paper are highlighting the supremacy of the supermarkets and their unsustainable ways and the fear and cost to local governments in challenging their hegemony.