Senior Tory backs labelling demand

Shadow agriculture spokeswoman Baroness Hazel Bysord joined the Yorkshire Agricultural Society in asking Agriculture Minister Nick Brown to make the country of origin clear after the show, the North's biggest celebration of British farming, discovered suppliers were selling Danish and Dutch bacon believing it was from this country.

At the moment, pig meat processed in Britain can be marked as being from the UK even if it is produced abroad.

Only the British Quality Standard mark guarantees that it comes from this country.

Baroness Bysord, visiting the show yesterday, said: "To me, anything that is marked British should be produced here. Anything just processed here should not display the British flag.

"People are eating more pork and they want to know they are eating British. Clear labelling is the best way of allowing them to do that."

She said she had urged the Government to improve labelling in the past, and would continue to do so.

The revelation that the Great Yorkshire Show was selling Dutch and Danish bacon was an embarrassment for the society, which has championed the cause of British pig farmers. It had sought an assurance that all bacon sold on the site would be home produced, and acted quickly to truck in replacement British meat after discovering the foreign produce on sale.

Baroness Bysord, who has a pig farm in Suffolk, also said the Government should ensure more support for farmers is used.

She said: "money is available and we should be claiming it all, which we are not doing at the moment. It has to be matched by Treasury money, but if the help is available then we should be claiming it.

"Farmers are toughened ruggers and they don't want to be treated as special cases, though they do ask that they are treated even-handedly and that is what we want to do."

The baroness told farmers at the show that the Conservatives would improve labelling, take a long-term look at farming and use schemes available to help them compete with other countries.