Letter: Ongoing farming challenges go beyond Brexit

He complains about soaring fertiliser prices, yet admits they have been driven by instability in the Strait of Hormuz and wider global events. Those are international supply issues, not the result of Britain leaving the European Union.

He also warns that post-Brexit trade deals have opened the floodgates to cheap Australian beef. The reality is rather different. Australian beef still accounts for only around 4% of UK beef imports and roughly 1% of total UK beef consumption. Ireland remains, by a considerable margin, our largest overseas supplier.

Then there is the familiar complaint about extra export paperwork when trading with the EU.

Yes, there is additional administration, but that has to be weighed against escaping thousands of pages of EU regulations and no longer sending over £12 billion of British taxpayers’ money to Brussels every year. That is a trade-off many Leave voters were perfectly willing to make.

Curiously, Rattus never seemed concerned when British farmers had to compete against unrestricted imports from across the EU under the Single Market. Imported meat was apparently acceptable then, but imports from democratic allies such as Australia suddenly become unacceptable now.

Brexit has presented some challenges, as every major constitutional change inevitably does, but it has also given Britain the freedom to strike its own trade agreements, control its own laws and regulate its own industries. Blaming every global economic problem on Brexit has become something of a reflex. Unfortunately, it does little to advance an honest debate about the real pressures facing British agriculture like inheritance tax.

Roman Jones, Welshpool