This is a subscriber-only article
Hailed the “Queen of the Countryside” when introduced by Laura Kuenssberg on BBC1 on Sunday morning, it is fair to say that National Farmers’ Union (NFU) president Minette Batters has successfully bridged the gap between farmers and the general public.
Now in her final year since taking the role in 2018, Ms Batters exuded class in a five-minute speech at the Ulster Farmers’ Union (UFU) annual dinner in Cookstown, Co Tyrone, last Friday night.
She heaped praise on her UFU hosts, thanked the cash cow that is insurance company, NFU Mutual, before moving on to tell a story about former British prime minister Boris Johnson.
It was April 2021 and Johnson’s aides were keen to get him on farm to promote British meat exports post-Brexit. Hosts in the Peak District were lined up, with a hungry lamb on hand for Boris to bottle feed.
The bottle was big and the lamb sucked hard. Realising what goes in must come out, Minette realised he was in danger and whisked the newly rotund lamb away. “I saved him from being on the front page of all the papers,” reckoned Minette.
She also put her concerns to Boris that the COVID-19 “rule of six” might be broken with all the advisers and aides standing around the farmyard.
“I might make the rules, but I haven’t got a clue what they are,” was allegedly his response.
SHARING OPTIONS: