Cllr Martin Whiteside, the Green party's Parliamentary candidate for Stroud, said: "If the Government are allowed to go through with their irresponsible and irreversible plans we are likely to see widespread GM contamination in Gloucestershire. Labour is playing Russian roulette with our environment. The irreversibility of this technology means that once the GM genie is out of the bottle, it will be impossible to put it back in."

Martin Whiteside added: "Illegal GM rice has already been found recently in our supermarkets, demonstrating how easy it is for our food to become contaminated. Labour and the biotech companies now want even weaker coexistence measures - in effect trying to legalise GM contamination of crops."

Cllr Philip Booth, co-author of the Green party report, said: "Our report sets out the overwhelming evidence against the government's proposals - I would urge people to read it on our website (www.glosgreenparty.org.uk) and make their own views known before the consultation closes on 20th October. Instead of allowing biotech companies to grow their crops, the government should be protecting our right to choose GM-free. We need tougher, not weaker, rules to prevent GM contamination of our food, farming and environment."


Threat to SW organic farming - and democracy

Martin Whiteside, a freelance development consultant advising agencies like Oxfam, Christian Aid and the United Nations on sustainable rural development programmes, originally studied Agriculture and Forest Sciences. He said: "The South West has the largest area in the country of organic agriculture: 900 farms (21% of the UKs total). It is obvious that in order to secure and build upon the future of the organic market the GM contamination threshold must be kept below the limit of detection. The choices offered by DEFRA do not even include a GM-free option and assume that allowing a routine GM-contamination of crops up to 0.9% will not harm health or the environment or damage the markets for organic and non-GM products."

Martin Whiteside said: "To press ahead with GM in spite of widespread scientific advice to the contrary is evidence of a Government that is extraordinarily arrogant and out of touch. This government has lost not just the economic and environmental case against GMOs, but also the democratic mandate. In the GM Nation debate in 2003 86% said they were unhappy to eat GM food, and 91% feared GM effects on the environment. In Stroud over a 100 marched against GM crops, thousands have sent in protest letters, others have taken action against the previous GM crop trials in Gloucestershire and the County Council declared itself a GM-free zone. Labour is showing more clearly than ever that it is more interested in keeping close to its corporate friends in the biotech industry than in safeguarding our environment and health."

UPDATE: 7th January 2007

Legal opinion from two European Law experts has stated that the Government's proposals for GM coexistence are legally and "fundamentally flawed". Although the consultation period has ended in England, you can still help protect our right to choose. Every MP should know about these legal findings because DEFRA's proposals would lead to routine, unlawful GM contamination. You can ask your MP to write to the Government demanding that they don't go ahead with these weak rules  by going to the Friends of the Earth website here.