Safe Speed Forums

I beleive this is a bad move as the loss of cheap motorsport events such as these will doubtless encourage the more irresponsible members (or just those who are less well off and cannot afford £200 for a track day) to race on the streets or in car parks.

I wouldn't bother with the petition myself as online petitions are generally a waste of time.

Any truth in this rumour though?

There are exceptions.

When Enduro-UK comes back up (or look using Google's cache) it explains how it is possible to safeguard sporting events on farm land. It may involve slightly more bureaucracy, but there's no question of an outright ban.

Tc.

There are NO exceptions. It is effectively an outright ban as DEFRA have undemocratically and without consultation or hardly any prior warning removed set-aside payments from farmers when any part of the set-aside is used for motorsports.

There are already motorsport event having been cancelled because of this. The MSA is already campaigning for its reversal and mor information can be found at
[url]http://www.britishrally.com/forum2/forum_posts.asp?TID=15257&PN=1
[/url]
The online petition is up to 7000+ already

It needs fighting, it is typical of an arrogant unrepresentative govt department and the culture that lead to £20 billion wasted over their foot and mouth fiasco.

Rubbish - the Foot and Mouth fiasco was a direct result of Tory deregulation efforts and agribusiness trying to do things on the cheap to maximise profits once the regulations were removed.

Tc.

I think that Richard was talking about the management of the crisis once it had started, which can hardly be blamed on the opposition. For example there is the question of immunisation as opposed to the giant barbie approach, and having committed to kill and grill why didn't they commit the resources to do it quickly and efficiently? Much of the cost was incurred due to the excessively long time that the countryside was shut down.

You can't blame agriculture for doing everything they can to survive in the face of constantly increasing (and costly) regulation while supermarkets keep pushing down the prices they will pay and the foreign competition isn't subject to the same restrictions.

I suspect that the problem with this regulation just comes down to the money - if the land is being used for motorsport - even for only a few weekends a year, then it is not exactly being set-aside for nature is it? I mean either the field is this dreamy meadow with wild flowers and butterflies, or it is a soft ground race track, and earning its keep. I think that the idea is that if you want to use some land for motorsport, then motorsport has to at least match the set-aside payment that the farmer would have got. The problem is where such land is only used occasionally and matching the set-aside payment is too much for the motorsport organisers.

Not so _tc_. FMD is bound to hit the UK from time to time. Its a highly contagious disease but not one that is that dangerous to most cloven hoofed farm animals. The UK has since the late 1800's used 'stamping out ' at the behest of the powerful landowners to preserve animal vields and values. Upto date International debated control measures include ring vaccination. The UK ( was MAFF renamed DEFRA in true newspeak style) rejected this and insisted on killing and burning as a control measure and refused to look at the alternatives. The disease itself is not that serious. DEFRA were clearly not competently in control from the outset with the govt seeming to allow them to pusue their hidden agendas against certain sections of this country. The Netherlands solved their outbreak in weeks and Uruguay using vaccination in far less time. DEFRA falsely blamed EU rules to justify their different actions.

At the time large parts of the country were under a police state control.

The country could not afford the £20 billion economic loss to farming, tourism, rural industry. Even UK motorsport companies went bust as a result of DEFRA's 7 months of mishandling. Their reaction was to rig the "enquiries" that Beckett et al set up, rush through legislation that conferred restrospective legality to thei many illegal actions during the fiasco, and issue a plan that showed NO lessons had been learned at all and a fressh outbreak will bring more of the same..

In this case DEFRA have done the same thing - acted unilaterally by decree.

For the full story see their info http://www.defra.gov.uk/news/2005/050329b.htm

Rewolf - the problem is that the inflexible regulations for set-aside mean that if any is disallowed, all is disallowed. It would be entirely reasonable for the set-aside to be reduced by the % of land that is used for other purposes. And the users pay the difference. But DEFRA will not do that - it seems to be that DEFRA are trying to reduce setaside payments and part of the hidden agenda is to use it to ban certain types of 'Motorsport'. No other temporary activity is banned.

These activities should be permitted without restriction and include:
Walking*
Bird spotting
School or university nature or farm visits
Horse riding along bridleways for which no charge is made*
Bicycle riding along defined paths or bridleways for which no charge is made*
Fishing
Hedge laying competitions, local ploughing competitions or other cultivation demonstrations within the applicable GAEC rules (excluding events where trade stands are present - these would fall under category B)
Shooting (game)
Deer Stalking
Drag hunting
(* Paths or bridleways that are metalled or surfaced would in any event be considered ineligible land)
B) Activities with greater restriction
Activities in this category will be permitted up to a 28 day limit. Examples are:-
Shooting (clay)
Car boot sales
Car parking whether associated with any of the activities listed in this note or not.
Country fairs and shows
Farm auctions and sales
Equestrian activities (including horse riding generally except along recognised bridleways for which no charge is made)
Paragliding, hand-gliding, ballooning etc
Festivals and events
Scout or guide camps or similar
TV and film locations

Caravan sites (for periods of more than 28 days, the affected area should not be used to support a claim. This need not affect a whole field.)
C) Activities that are inconsistent with the land being considered as remaining in agricultural use
These include:
All motor sports (this does not include static car events)
Where the principal purpose of the land is for recreational activities, such as a golf course, other permanent sports facilities or gallops.

European agriculture is - that's the whole point of the EU regs. The only reason France and Germany stole a march on us in the '80s was because Thatcher's pigheaded refusal to get with the programme meant that we became the 'poor relation' of Europe for nearly 2 decades.



Sounds fair.



Little paranoid-sounding there, friend.

Listen - the simple fact is that things are changing and the change is out of our hands - dictated by corporates holed up in ivory towers in the States and to a lesser degree on the Continent. All we can do is adapt to those changes. Britain's place in the European economy is primarily tourism and service sector, as the corporates have decreed that without widespread GM adoption, farming here is not viable. Likewise manufacturing for us city folk (and slowly, technology too), when it's far cheaper and better for their bottom lines to produce such things in China and India, where the cost of living is substantially lower. While I'm a city boy, as a software engineer, I'm screwed long-term too unless I feel like learning Punjabi.

As I said, there is *nothing* we can do to change this as long as we have strongly pro-business factions in charge of government. The only viable alternative party is even more pro-business than the current lot, and as the '80s proved, what's good for business is usually bad for humanity.

Tc.

The big issue round here is Motorcycle Trials. One Trial has already been cancelled and it is being predicted that the annual Scott Trial which normally takes place in October will not be run this year because of Defra's ruling.
I suspect that this is not an intentional ban on motorsports, simply a failure to recognise all the uses to which farm and estate land is put to. I bet it is not an EU ruling either.

_Tc-..Agree with everything you have said. Even to the point of suggesting I'm a bit paranoid. I looked into FMD in great detail - ( well Motorsport was effectively banned by DEFRA in 2001 ) I was pretty shocked by what I learned. Don't get me started on the beatings up, the breaking and entering and illegal slaughter the DEFRA squads carried out. It certainly and cynically prepared me for what goes on in most things the govt and their agencies actually do "for " us. Most people who have looked into things like the Iraq war are probably paranoid too

But the power of the people can have an effect. and 7000 signatures in a few days shortly before an election has that effect Yesterday DEFRA issued this

http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/capreform/singlepay/land/pdf/msport-04052005.pdf

They never admit they are wrong but this seems a reasonable back-track.

Foot and mouth was caused by an illegal consignment of meat entering the food chain. If cusoms can't police the ports on an island we are stuffed.