Sir,

Under Edward Heath’s government, it was felt strongly that we should become part of the European Community. This received strong opposition from France and this meant that we had to make many concessions before they would consider our application, which included our fishing industry and the Milk Marketing Board.

One of the reasons why the later called EU wanted us in was we were a densely populated country and they wanted us as a market for their surplus food. They soon realised that they could not compete with our very efficient MMB and one of the conditions was that we should do away with the monopoly powers of the board.

This I have always spoken out very strongly about, but the government agreed and our unions were too weak and sold a watered down version of the MMB to the producers. In other words they gave the key to the hen house to the fox as they took the monopoly powers away from the producer and gave it to the trade. The consequence was the price to the producer fell from the highest in Europe to among the lowest in three years, with no benefit to the housewife.

This has had a devastating effect on our dairy industry which at one time was the envy of the world. Now that we are withdrawing from the European Community, can we have our Milk Marketing Board back with full monopoly powers?

Speaking in round figures, the producer at the moment is receiving about twenty pence per litre, the processor ten pence and the supermarket twenty pence. Should the supermarket receive the same margin as the producer when they receive delivery in the morning and the money goes through the till before nightfall and take up to ninety days to pay for delivery? If we do not obtain the monopoly powers back, then I think that the producers must look at ways of bypassing the supermarkets and have the twenty pence per litre. Do you agree?

Sir Eric Howells CBE,

Llanddewi Velfrey.