A Day in the Country

November 2010

Cheltenham Friends of the Earth were lucky, Martin Horwood, MP for Cheltenham was a co-sponsor of the Sustainable Livestock Bill. Even so, we decided to show our support for the Bill, raising awareness and maybe influencing other MPs who were not so supportive.

Head office offered to send us some cardboard animal masks and lend us some cow costumes, but we thought that it would be more fund to borrow some real live dairy cows from a local farmer.

Once everything was aranged, the press were notified and at the appointed time some nervous group members, and Martin Horwood MP, were introduced to the dairy herd. The event was great fun, and the pictures of Martin with the cows and the story made the front page of the Gloucestershire Echo - complete with an awful pun. Unfortunately the Bill was 'talked out' at its second reading, and did not become law. Despite this the profile of the issue has been raised, and we hope that the MOOvement will continue to put pressure on the Government to address the problem.

We are very grateful to Ben Pullen (and the cows) at Home Farm in Churchdown for his support with this campaign.