St George’s Day Lunch

Club Chairman John Lee presents engraved glasses

SAINT GEORGE RETURNS! Cross-bench peer Lord Trees delivered the St George’s Day lunch address in the Club – the first since 2019. Andrei Spence reports IT was an absolute delight that this muchmissed annual event made a welcome re-appearance to the Club calendar after a break of three years, following the interruptions caused by the pandemic. Owing to its proximity to the Easter Bank Holiday weekend numbers were down a little. However, 45 members and guests enjoyed a superb afternoon in celebration of St George’s Day. One of the highlights of the afternoon was the superbly crafted lunch created by Paul and his team and expertly and efficiently delivered by Jelle and the Food & Beverage team. Chairman John Lee welcomed all those attending and was very pleased to report the re-commencement of this event, which had been held last in April 2019! John was particularly pleased to welcome as our guest of honour and speaker, Professor The Lord Trees, Club member, Peer and eminent scientist and academic in the field of veterinary parasitology. The Farmers Suite was decorated with beautiful red roses and flags on each table and it was not long before the

A marvellously entertaining luncheon

noise reverberating around the suite was something akin to that we were used to in previous years.

There was a very definite emphasis on people catching up with friends and colleagues after our enforced restrictions, and much debate about the various political machinations occurring within the Agriculture Bill, and its inclusions and exclusions. Debate just as it used to be!

As lunch finished, John introduced our speaker, Lord Trees, a very well-known member of the Club and staunch supporter. Lord ‘Sandy’ Trees is a world renowned vet, scientist and of recent years, politician on the cross benches of the House of Lords. It was with this emphasis on his life in Parliament, that Sandy started his talk.

First, however, he was very proud of being recognised one evening on the Terrace of the Club. As many of you may know, Lord Trees often sits out on the Terrace of an evening working away, covered with a blanket and accompanied by something in a glass and a Cuban cigar. Another Club member remarked on said evening, that if Sandy had been wearing a hat, he could have passed for being Clint Eastwood! The audience was then treated to a number of anecdotes of life in Parliament, such as the time a Government minister was repeatedly telling the Lords that the Government was ‘monitoring the situation’, until a famous Scottish peer interjected that the Scotland goalkeeper, Frank Haffey, in a match against England, had monitored the ball going into the back of his net nine times. The point was that he was meant to stop it!!

Lord Trees went on to give some understanding of what the House of Lords is not. Many people think that the Lords if full of hereditary peers, which it isn’t, with most members being appointed by nomination by the leaders of the major parties, who pass them on to the Prime Minister and then on to the Monarch. There are Bishops and hereditary peers, and also those who are selected through the Appointments Commission, set up in 2000 to try to introduce extra peers on a non-party basis, to the Lords.

Lord Trees set about explaining the primary role of the Lords in being a revising chamber, scrutinizing what the Commons brings before it, or is proposing, and done by people who have a broad range of expertise and knowledge across many fields.

He admitted that though there were some poor examples on occasion, on the whole this range of experience was invaluable and he cited the recent Agriculture and Environment Bills, which had very few amendments made by the House of Commons, but around 200 amendments from the Lords. It can exert considerable influence in Government thinking and approach.

Lord Trees addressed the very serious issue of our pursuit of ‘net zero’. He assumed that we would all be in favour of decarbonising our economies and would want to save lives and keep a lid on global temperatures. But he saw the danger that in the process of doing so over the next twenty or thirty years, we may damage or inhibit our own industries, and end up importing more and more goods produced to environmental standards much inferior to our own.

Lord Trees opined that with only one global atmosphere above us, exporting emissions to India or China to make our steel doesn’t really solve the global problem. Likewise in the agricultural sector, we must be careful not to damage our own livestock industry on the requirements of environmental demands of greenhouse gas emissions, only to find we import beef, lamb and dairy products from countries with poorer environmental sustainability measures, than we have in the UK.

A rousing round of applause was given for a masterful talk, with many very humorous stories, and a very serious side to some of the present day issues the country and farmers face. On completion, John Lee presented Lord Trees with a pair of Farmers Club tumblers and gave thanks on behalf of those present.