This is interesting....

[grassfarmer]

Well if it isn't coming from the "market" and its coming from the taxpayers ...how is it not new money ...and the better question is ...how is it not impacting western canadian farmers prices????

If a buyer can buy lower cost product from the UK and the taxpayer there infills for the farmer.....why come to Canada to buy???

There isn't an open market ....that is a fairy tale....this is another example of it...

It's not new money in that it's the same or less than they've had annually for years and years - not going to be a market disrupter in Canada. They are nothing like competitive on price anyway so you don't have much to fear from UK competition.

[grassfarmer]

So, grassy, you don’t think your Pal who gets over $1.7 million annual payment, from the taxpayers, is going to be resented by his neighbour with an electrical business .. who is forced to shell out this money to a farmer?
Surely you jest.

The annual erosion of credibility of any continuoulsy-subsidized farmer to make his own living surely must impact the industry-reputation as a whole.

Not jesting at all - there is a segment of the community that always think farmers are rich and given too much taxpayer money but it's not a large segment. Most still think farmers are fairly upstanding citizens that work hard and aren't getting rich doing it. I think the disconnect between consumers and the farm actually helps on this score as they have no idea of the costs involved running a farm business with multi-million$ real estate and machinery in the hundreds of thousands.

There is actually more resentment within agriculture of the top handful of welfare recipients - not because they are big and successful but because they got there by cheating the system. Most of the big recipients in Scotland are livestock dealer/farmers. In the top handful at one time were a guy taken to court for forging dead people's signatures to profit from BSE status opportunities and another caught on his livestock inspection day (Gov officials coming to count cows) hauling liner loads that had been counted in the morning to another farm of his to get counted again in the afternoon. These from guys already getting north of $1 million a year subsidy.

Don't get me wrong I'm not defending the subsidy system there, it is what it is, and it's not going anywhere. I moved here in part to get away from that system.