Eastbourne council should be helping young farmers get on the ladder

So, Eastbourne Borough Council have relet one of the farms on the Sussex Downs.

While it’s better than selling it off, do they forget the reason we had council farms in the first place? It was to introduce young farmers to get onto the farming ladder.

Allowing the farm to be taken over by an existing tenant was not the idea.

We have hundreds of young people coming out of Plumpton College,who would like to go farming.

True, one needs a large sum of capital to start, and a large unit would cost too much to begin one working farming life.

But what an opportunity to create some small holdings on the Downs and allow young people to have their own account.

Maybe when we leave the European Union the capital we give the EU can be used to create small farming enterprises, with the government underwriting any loan given to those starting out.

Food security is something no political party are taking seriously. They should,we all need feeding.

Long-term tenancy arrangements are needed.

We are seeing too many land speculates purchasing land and renting it out on year by year agreement.

That’s not good enough, while those renting such land can’t live on the holding,and livestock is often not looked after properly.