Y TIR FUWMATTERS
Wh y Virtue Sign ju st isn’t fo
I WAS having some difficu lty preparing to write this article. Whenever I looked at the paper I ju st cou ldn’t get my pento move. The last 10 days have seenthe news with next to nothing abou t Brexit as Parliament has beenonholiday, and of cou rse, the pleasant sunny weather over the Easter weekend was most enjoyable too. Then, as I was driving home onenight, something onthe
radio really made me smile. Apparently, today, as I write this, is St George’s
Day.Well, it is for some people. Now, I’m not really a follower of St George, I’ve
got far more important patron saints to worry abou t, bu t it made me smile to hear that whilst 23 April is St George’s Day, apparently today, this year it’s not! For a technical reasonknownbest to the Chu rch of England, St George’s day
cannot be celebrated inEaster week. Therefore, whenthe 23 April falls inEaster week the Saint’s day is celebrated inthe week following ‐ onApril 30,not April 23 as many expected. Bu t I wasn’t lau ghing at that itself. What was really entertaining was a comment
onthe radio that many, many MPs ‐ who had retu rned to work inthe Hou se of Commons that day ‐ had beenwishing each other a “Happy St George’s Day” for most of the day. And indoing so had got it wrong. Withou t checking the accu racy of what they were saying, they had plou ghed on
“as normal”, trying to demonstrate how tuned into a particu lar su bject they were by expressing a probably unnecessary sentiment. There’s a term for this, created inthe last few years, and it’s called “virtu e‐
signalling” ‐ which is defined as “the actionor practice of pu blicly expressing opinions or sentiments intended to demonstrate one’s good character or the moral correctness of one’s positionona particu lar issu e.” Oftenthou gh, it is ju st spou ting a message for the sake of popu lism and u sed to
demonstrate how the “virtu ou s signaller” is well connected to anissu e, evenif in reality, they are not. You don’t evenneed to tru ly agreewith amessage ‐ you ju stneed to say the “right
thing”. It’s a pointless exercise, in many cases vacu ou s and very often shows the
perpetrators of virtu e signalling forwhat they are, people chasing pu blic opinionand popu list view. I reckonthat there are lessons here for u s: weneverneed to spou t for the sake of
it. We need to continu e checking ou r facts and ensu ring we know what we are saying before we say it. And we need to ensu re that ou r message has real valu e rather than playing to a popu list opinion. That way we shall be tru sted and respected for what we say. Becau se I do think that we stick to the facts, we only comment whenwe need to
and we will continu e to work like this, and not be su cked into the unnecessary messaging that some others u se. There are many seriou s issu es facing farmers and farming over the coming years.
Some will be takenu p by other organisations laying the blame at farmers and will play well to popu list listeners. Bu t we, the only tru ly representative organisationfor the Welsh farmer, are prepared to deal with those, whilst also maintaining ou r ownhigh standards.
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allin r me by Alan Davies, FUWManaging Director g
FUW NEWS
WELSH FirstMinisterMark Drakeford AM(pictu red right with FUWpresiden t Glyn Rob
erts) will be
addressing this year’s FUWLtd June meeting of Grand Council onMonday June 1 7 at 9 .4 5 am at theWilliam Davies Conference Centre, IBERS, Plas Gogerddan,
Aberystwyth.Members of the FUWfrom acrossWales will be gathering to discuss critical issues and concerns facing the farming industry. Every county chairman, vice chairman, three representatives of each county, the presidential policy team, and chairmen of all of the union’s standing committees will be in attendance. All members of the FUWare welcome.
3 First Minister keynotespeaker
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