Countryside Alliance

26/06/2026

Oxfordshire Council is under mounting pressure to scrap its meat and dairy ban after two high-profile councils moved to reverse similar plant-based catering policies.

The Countryside Alliance has written to Oxfordshire Council leader Tim Bearder, urging the authority to abandon its policy and instead promote local, sustainable produce and freedom of choice⬇️

25/06/2026

👍Meat’s BACK on the menu: the first council to bring in a BAN on meat from being served at council meetings has SCRAPPED the policy pledging to “put meat back on the menu”.

It looks like Calderdale will follow soon too. We have written to the Leader of Oxfordshire County Council urging him to follow suit in unbanning meat and dairy from being served at council events and meetings. It’s an insult to our hardworking livestock farmers and an attack on freedom of choice. The Countryside Alliance has spearheaded a national campaign urging councils to reject enacting plant-based ONLY menus in favour of pledging to support local farmers, growers and producers whether it’s meat, dairy or vegetables.

Councils should be supporting all farmers and freedom of choice. We will keep you updated.

24/06/2026

With so many attacks on the countryside, it can be hard to keep up with the latest rural news.

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24/06/2026

The current heatwave poses many issues - not least among them the very real risk of devastating wildfires.

24/06/2026

Momentum is with rural people. It's not too late for the government to stop the toxic culture war, and drop the unjustified and unnecessary proposed trail hunting ban.

23/06/2026

Important update regarding the Wales and Border Counties Hound Show at Builth Wells, due to take place on Thursday 25 June, which has understandably been cancelled due to the weather conditions.

It is with great regret that, due to the continued adverse weather conditions and with animal welfare and the safety of all involved as our overriding priorities, we have taken the difficult decision to cancel the hound show this Thursday (25th June).

Despite working closely with our veterinary surgeons and putting extensive measures in place to safeguard the welfare of the hounds, the prevailing conditions have left us with no viable alternative.

After careful consideration, and in the best interests of the hounds, exhibitors, judges, officials, volunteers and spectators, we believe this is the only responsible course of action.

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to the Royal Welsh Showground for their flexibility, assistance and support with our last-minute adjustments, as well as for providing access to their excellent facilities. We are also extremely grateful to our veterinary team for their invaluable advice, guidance and ongoing support throughout this process.

Finally, we would like to thank everyone for their patience and understanding over the past few days while we explored every possible option to enable the show to proceed and carefully monitored the ongoing forecast.

We kindly ask that you allow the committee a few days to discuss the next steps and consider our plans moving forward. We will be in touch with further information as soon as possible.

Thank you for your continued support and understanding.

22/06/2026

‼️UPDATE - CANCELLED DUE TO RED WEATHER ‼️

All roads lead to Builth this Thursday!

Join us at the Wales and Border Counties Hound Show, a core fixture of the rural calendar that welcomes packs from across Wales and neighbouring English counties in friendly competition. We look forward to seeing many of you there!

22/06/2026

🔥🗞️Hot off the press: “Demonstrations by farmers and rural people on the streets of Westminster have been a regular occurrence. Only last week, outside the DEFRA offices, in opposition to the trail hunting ban, protestors demanded an end to ‘war on the countryside’. It never needed to be like this.

It is difficult not to conclude that Sir Keir wasted an opportunity to build on the goodwill given to him and his party at the election. We have seen taxes on rural businesses and toxic culture war policies, including a ban on trail hunting and a clamp down on game shooting- all of which will further harm an already fragile rural economy- being priorities for this Government.

Whether it’s Andy Burnham, or someone else, I am sure we will hear a lot about ‘change’ over the coming weeks. Given events in the last two years, you will forgive rural people for being somewhat sceptical about what that means. ‘Change’ certainly does not start with culture war in the countryside and a return to the mistakes of the past. It means legislating for rural communities, not against them.

If the next Prime Minister is serious about delivering that, we stand ready to work with the next government to achieve the very best for our countryside”.

Mo Metcalf-Fisher for the Daily Express⬇️

Britain's rural communities are hoping for a reset with the Government following Keir Starmer's resignation, writes Mo Metcalf-Fisher at the Countryside Alliance.

22/06/2026

Earlier this morning, Sir Keir Starmer announced his resignation as Prime Minister.

Whoever succeeds him should learn from their predecessor's mistakes, and start legislating for rural communities, not against them.

21/06/2026

“This enormous response shows that, whilst polling consistently confirms that hunting legislation is at the bottom of the list of voters' priorities, people across the country are rallying to the support of the hunting community”.

In the past 12 weeks we have sent a resounding message to Westminster and the country as a whole that we will not allow trail hunting to be banned without a fight. If the government thought that this was going to be a simple walk in the countryside it will have to recalculate.

By our calculations this is already the largest consultation response to Defra in modern times, beating the consultation on the badger cull in 2011 which had 65,000 submissions.

20/06/2026

"The Government is opening a Pandora's box, and if they have any sense, they will close it again”.

Momentum is with the countryside. The government would do well to listen to us and drop their toxic culture war.

20/06/2026

Do you think councils should be banning meat and dairy?

Enfield Council is "Beefing back up Enfield", backing British livestock farmers, and reversing the ridiculous meat ban previously brought in.