The LEFT and Irish Farming

lcwill · 04-11-2015 12:43pm

Small land owning farmers were amongst the first against the wall under Stalin. They stood in the way of collectivisation. Anyone who had so much as sold a pig in the previous year was on a train to the Gulags as a class enemy before they knew what was happening.

barnaman · 04-11-2015 9:39pm

Yeah but Patsy look at farming at the moment all the "farmers" are being told lease your land under a written lease its dead handy money no income tax etc. The farming/ag land ownership etc is reverting to what it was except with a load of smaller landlords rather than one big one. Whats really farcical is that some of the lads leasing land to farmers got it off the Land Comission in the first place. I think the land is often farmed inefficiently the current system means you are better off not farming just drawing down payments. One lad love to give his nickname but would be too well known has €100,000 of a BFP and not even own a tractor. Any industry that requires serious EU support through BFP and grants has a major efficiency issue.

Dickie10 · 04-11-2015 11:17pm

i think the land commission was very short sighted in creating farms under 120-150 acres , anything smaller really doent give you a good income for a family without off farm employment. now that being said i mean 120-150 acre farms ran efficeintly and intensivley, it can be hard to do these things while working off farm. if part time farmers were to calculate there labour hours even at 13-15 euro an hour they would be unviable

Username John · 04-11-2015 11:50pm

Dickie10 wrote: »

i think the land commission was very short sighted in creating farms under 120-150 acres , anything smaller really doent give you a good income for a family without off farm employment. now that being said i mean 120-150 acre farms ran efficeintly and intensivley, it can be hard to do these things while working off farm. if part time farmers were to calculate there labour hours even at 13-15 euro an hour they would be unviable

But how long ago were the land commission around?
It's easy to say they were short sighted, it's 150 acres today, what size will be needed in 20 years time? 400acres?

barnaman · 05-11-2015 1:12am

Land Commission still existing until the 1990s and made land grants until the 1980s. What it did was give people who were not farmers but labourers farms and cottages of c22acres. Then different "small farmers" were given fields etc all sorts of different criteria applied as to who got a grant of land. Whining paid off big time here is a real life example elderly farmer of 150 acres in 1950s son goes to America local small farmers start petioning local TDs etc for farm to be broken up and given to them as land not being used etc. Son had to return from america to just about save farm being taken and divided. Thats also why conacre exists if lease was longer then 11 months. People would petition the Land Comission TDs etc to say farm not being farmed and should be bought by Land Comission for redistribution. Payment for land was not even in cash but useless non tradable bonds that had a 1 to 2 percent intest rate. Totally useless. Thats the point about the left that the OP was making Ireland was totally shaped by radical Socialism for a long time. All full time farmers in my area are farming around 400acres (owned and rented). Nearest neighbour farming a 1000acres and thats the way is gone in farming like any other industry scale wins out.

patsy_mccabe · 05-11-2015 9:41am

I was talking to a relative recently. Asked him how was the son getting on in Australia. Fine, he's working on a 16,000 acre tillage farm. :rolleyes:
No forgetting the vicegrips there.

einn32 · 05-11-2015 10:14am

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

I was talking to a relative recently. Asked him how was the son getting on in Australia. Fine, he's working on a 16,000 acre tillage farm. :rolleyes:
No forgetting the vicegrips there.

Yeah but you need a lot of land in oz to make a living. Of course it depends on where you are too. I'm in western Australia and tis not an easy place to farm.

selectamatic · 05-11-2015 7:35pm

There are too many variables to consider deciding which "side" to take when talking about the work of the land commission. Sure there were some questionable practices especially relating to land being in "use" but the main reasoning behind the formation of the land commission was noble and it was indeed needed. The notion that farmers who benefited from the land commission were whingers does a great disservice to their struggles. These were lower class "peasant" farmers who had nothing due to the occupation of their native lands, It's easy to say that these large estates shouldn't have been broke up but lets be honest the vast majority of them weren't bought in the first place they were forcibly taken. I know this is going back hundreds of years but these facts cannot be ignored when considering the actions undertaken by governments and national organisations of the last 100 years. The vast majority of the land commissions work was carried out pre 1960 so the perspective of acreage was way different to what it is now, most farms were still using horses or manual labor.
As said to question the methods of some of the actions taken by the land commission is understandable and indeed justified in some cases but to question the need for it's existence is madness. Sure the people who benefited the most from it could be perceived to be merely laborers and not farmers, but when you look back at the history of Ireland prior to the land commission it's clearly evident why these laborers didn't have farms of their own even though many of their ancestors were farming the lands of Ireland long before the "landlords".

patsy_mccabe · 05-11-2015 7:57pm

You're spot on Selectamatic. Over half our farm was the result of a land commission divide. People should go and look at Griffiths Valuation of circa 1850. All the large landlords and tenants are listed there. The local landlord in our area had an estate of over 11,000 acres. He don't get that through hard work.
http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/history/cromwell_settlement.htm

mayota · 05-11-2015 8:07pm

Great post selectamatic, barnaman making very good points too. The land commission were eyeing up land here too but with the option of a move to Meath in exchange.

Stinicker · 05-11-2015 9:04pm

Our family farm came from the land commission and we had been tenants on it since the early 1800's from the original Protestant Landlords, unsurprisingly then that our family fought and died for the IRA against the British almost 100 years ago, the main thing was always about getting control of the land and of our own destiny.

I think that foreign ownership of land in Ireland should be banned as should fragmentation to prevent smaller farms being created. I personally think a new Land Commision should be established to give the state first refusal in all private property sales and regulate the price of farm land.

Farming should not be treated as a corporate business it should be for farmers the stewards of the land who live and work it. Corporate Business Farming is no different to the landlords where the profits are milked and the slaves work for nothing.

Larry Goodman, Fianna Fail, the factories and the IFA have always been the biggest threats to Irish farmers, we have seen the dairy sector almost destroyed by the removal of quotas; when it should have been tightly regulated. Also there should a state owned Agricultural Bank strictly for farming and ran as a non-profit to help farmers, especially disadvantaged farmers on marginal quality land.

Farm subsidy incomes should also be capped and if a person has a big farm and he can produce then good luck to him but he should then be getting little to no subsidys, subsidys should exist to protect the small working farmer and for to bring life into rural Ireland.

This is where the left should fit into Irish farming, to help farmers not work against them.

Cattlepen · 05-11-2015 9:37pm

the land commission activity in meath,kildare and Dublin was deliberately done with the intention of improving the Fianna Fail vote in these areas.It certainly wasn't for the good of the people. Farms were taken off people who were not the rich and landed, That had earned them themselves through hard graft, not by birthright. This should not be overlooked as just a few" questionable practices". There was favouritism in the dishing out of the best land also

pedigree 6 · 05-11-2015 9:45pm

As I said before politics and religion should not be discussed on f&f boards.
Save yourselves while you still can. I'm not trying to do the mods job but this ain't going to end pretty. People have died for less. The past is the past and the future is what we have to look to.

Edit: I still think there's posters doing this because an election is coming up.

barnaman · 05-11-2015 10:00pm

As sure Politics and religion are what makes Irish History!

My own family here centuries and involved everything from 98, Land League, (which cost us alot of land as LL refused to rent to us tried to btibe us with extra land to stop activites) to the Tan War etc. My family bought out farm under the Land Acts while British were still here. My own gf was sentenced to death for IRA activiies but was commuted, took Republican side never recognised the State till day he died never took an old age pension let alone his IRA one. You could apply for LC grant based on IRA service which he held in high distain as a cheapened the cause to a cheap struggle for personal gain and b lots lads applying did nothing. Was complete favouritism in LC grants and can guarentee in our area lots of it was based pull and complaining, and stirring. THe Irish Water its my "Human Right" crowd did not appear from nowhere.

Personally I hate subisidies as its more of the same mentality noone should be subsidied to do anything. Agri bank would be great idea and hopefull will be an EU version of it soon.

mayota · 05-11-2015 10:20pm

pedigree 6 wrote: »

As I said before politics and religion should not be discussed on f&f boards.
Save yourselves while you still can. I'm not trying to do the mods job but this ain't going to end pretty. People have died for less. The past is the past and the future is what we have to look to.

Edit: I still think there's posters doing this because an election is coming up.

I lol' at your edit pedigree 6.

Dickie10 · 05-11-2015 10:33pm

for a second their i thought "gf" stood for girlfriend!! my bad, !:P

BG2.0 · 12-11-2015 8:21pm

What's yours is now everyone's, coming to a country near you!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/countryside/11988874/Landowners-could-be-stripped-of-well-managed-property.html

ganmo · 12-11-2015 9:21pm

theres been a phrase rattling around my head for the last week

"What's yours is everyone's but What's mine is my own"

freedominacup · 14-11-2015 12:21pm

ganmo wrote: »

theres been a phrase rattling around my head for the last week

"What's yours is everyone's but What's mine is my own"

Too much of this thread seems based on the premise I own land therefore I'm entitled to earn a living from it.

ganmo · 14-11-2015 9:53pm

freedominacup wrote: »

Too much of this thread seems based on the premise I own land therefore I'm entitled to earn a living from it.

I don't think you're entitled to a living but you should be allowed to choose how you utilise it.

Dickie10 · 12-09-2019 10:28pm

well lads i threw this out there 4 years ago, do you think things have changed in the political landscape? have some farmers now nothing to lose and is a revolution at the ballot box now inevitable?

Say my name · 12-09-2019 10:58pm

It'll be a Fine Gael / Green Party coalition next time around.

If the Greens continue on the upward trend they could even be a majority party in the election after that.
It's a worldwide phenomenon atm.

Keep Sluicing · 12-09-2019 11:24pm

2 farmers I've done jobs for in the last week were considering voting for the greens. I was amazed, but while i think it be partially a protest vote, it was also hoping that it might make their farms (very different farms) viable.

Are the Greens part of the left?

older by the day · 12-09-2019 11:27pm

Say my name wrote: »

It'll be a Fine Gael / Green Party coalition next time around.

If the Greens continue on the upward trend they could even be a majority party in the election after that.
It's a worldwide phenomenon atm.

It's easy enough to get council seats, as they don't have power. But most people go back to their own colours when it comes to the dail. Plus with a nice belt of a carbon tax coming, most don't vote for pain

Birdnuts · 12-09-2019 11:30pm

Say my name wrote: »

It'll be a Fine Gael / Green Party coalition next time around.

If the Greens continue on the upward trend they could even be a majority party in the election after that.
It's a worldwide phenomenon atm.

No thanx - the last time they were in government they promoted dirty diesel and were asleep at the wheel when the bank guarantee was foisted on the country. I'm all for a party that promotes sustainability and protection of our natural heritage/resources but I don't believe the likes of Eamon Ryan are sincere on many of these issues and in any case too many of them have a smug, D4 centred view of the world

riemann · 14-09-2019 3:30pm

Buford T. Justice VI wrote: »

Michael D being just 2 that spring to mind. There was little separation in the principles that bound both rural and urban TDs.

Our dear leader doing a day's work?

He'd be far to busy sowing dissent in the herd, when he wasn't writing poetry.

riemann · 14-09-2019 3:45pm

Say my name wrote: »

It'll be a Fine Gael / Green Party coalition next time around.

Their answer to everything is increase taxes. This hits the poor much harder than others.

Their demographic is NIMBY middle class dogooders who spend most of their time parading around on their bicycles in Ranelagh to collect their daily supply of avacados in Fallon and Byrne (fresh from South America) , to try out a recepie they seen in a vegan cookbook picked up on one of their all two frequent "short weekend breaks" across Europe.

Preaching to the rest of us that we're destroying the world and should go back to a more sustainable way of farming which their non binary cis gendered son/daughter Lesley will happily explain to you as they spent a summer building mud huts with a tribe in Sudan and thus have it all figured out.

For what's its worth I would agree with a green agenda in so far as a philosophy of "first do no harm", but the reality is people want and expect cheap food. In a lot of cases it's not hard to understand why as many people are squeezed from all sides so will cut costs any way they can.

Going green is a rich person's pursuit in the current climate.

NewbridgeIR · 14-09-2019 3:48pm

Keep Sluicing wrote: »

Are the Greens part of the left?

Definitely

serfspup · 14-09-2019 8:19pm

Dickie10 wrote: »

well lads i threw this out there 4 years ago, do you think things have changed in the political landscape? have some farmers now nothing to lose and is a revolution at the ballot box now inevitable?

some posts on facebook from leftwing groups supporting beef protest very interesting times indeed

mf240 · 15-09-2019 8:13pm

serfspup wrote: »

some posts on facebook from leftwing groups supporting beef protest very interesting times indeed

Just opportunistic populism.

The LEFT and Irish Farming

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