SPECIAL REPORT: In the otherwise unassuming chambers of Oxfordshire County Council, a battle for the future was fought in the heart of Middle England, and the vegans and environmentalists emerged victorious. Claire Hamlett attended today’s historic vote in favour of plant-based menus.

When I woke up this morning I didn’t expect to be called a moron by Jeremy Clarkson, nor to hear an elected official use the phrase “suck a lump of tofu”. But here we are, on the other side of an Oxfordshire County Council meeting where cabinet members voted in favour of a motion to make catering at council events entirely plant-based and to introduce more plant-based options in schools for which the county provides meals.

By adopting this motion, Oxfordshire County Council joins several others around the UK that are increasing the availability of plant-based food in the public sector. County councils are responsible for their own procurement and can make decisions about what food to source for their own canteens and events as well as schools, hospitals, and prisons. Given the reluctance we have seen from the British government to take any bold action on reforming our food system or acting on climate change (and undermining any positive changes it does make with awful decisions like its trade deal with Australia), progress seems more likely to come at the local level. In voting for the plant-based motion today, Oxfordshire County Council is helping to lead by example on moving the UK towards diets that place less emphasis on animal-derived ingredients and normalising this type of climate action.

Dozens of people gathered outside the County Council offices ahead of the meeting to express their support for or opposition to the motion. Local animal farmers brought sausage rolls and placards saying “Support Our Local Food and Farmers”. Those in favour of the motion held signs saying the same thing, except with the emphasis on locally grown fruit and vegetables. There was a flurry of excitement when Clarkson - whose farm seems to mostly produce crops - showed up to deliver his contribution to proceedings. After calling supporters of the motion (among them Feed our Future, local author and campaigner Linda Newbery, supportive councillors and yours truly) “morons”, he told journalists he would scrape the mashed potatoes off his shepherd’s pie to feed any vegans who came to his house and left without attending the meeting.

A number of people spoke during the meeting, with those in favour citing clear evidence to back up the need to shift to a more plant-based food system, such as from Project Drawdown and from the latest IPCC report. They also carefully explained, over and over, the modest proposals of the motion in order to rebut the efforts of the opposition to conflate it with forcing veganism on everyone. Green Cllr Ian Middleton, who originally tabled the motion, said that it was “never about veganism” but about bringing the council’s food procurement in line with the National Food Strategy, which was published last year and duly ignored by Westminster, and the recommendations of the government’s own Climate Change Committee to reduce consumption of meat and dairy in the UK by 20 per cent by 2030. As the council declared a climate emergency in 2019 and committed to being carbon neutral by 2030, Middleton pointed out that his motion is what “climate change action looks like.”

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One theme that has been prevalent in the public debate about the motion in the weeks leading up to today’s meeting is that it is anti-farmer. Karl Franklin, an Oxfordshire sheep farmer, argued in the meeting that the council should “back British farming” and cited the welfare standards of Red Tractor and the efforts to mitigate climate change by the National Farmers’ Union to make his case. It isn’t surprising that the cabinet was unconvinced, given the NFU’s climate plan involves techno-fixes like feed additives and gene editing to reduce methane emissions from cows, and growing so-called energy crops to burn for fuel, and given that Red Tractor has repeatedly proved itself incapable of preventing breaches of even its low standards of welfare.

Linda Newbery, who has been a key figure in rallying support for the motion and addressed the cabinet, challenged the narrative that it was anti-farmer, pointing out that it would support local producers and deliver more cost-effective, nutritious food to schools, allowing them to spend more money on better quality local animal products rather than the cheap intensively farmed products that fill the supermarkets. Jimmy Pierson, director of ProVeg UK, described the success of its School Plates program and how satisfied students and their parents have been with the increased plant-based options. 

Though most of the contributions to the debate were sensible and grounded in evidence, one, in particular, stood out for its hyperbole and inflammatory language. Conservative Cllr David Bartholomew, who has been a vocal opponent of the motion since it was tabled in December, insisted on referring to the motion as one about veganism, which it is not, and suggested that since veganism is a protected belief perhaps the choice to eat meat should be too. He spoke of “compulsory vegan” food and complained that he did not want to be forced to “suck a lump of tofu”, raising concerns about whether he knows how to eat food. He further accused the council of authoritarianism and asked if next they would start to dictate what clothes councillors could wear to meetings. Like Clarkson, his appeal was to the lowest common denominator of “freedom of choice”, ignoring the fact that nobody was actually suggesting a ban on meat or dairy in schools or that all councillors had to be vegans, and the fact that plant-based food is actually more inclusive than meaty meals since everyone, including children, can and should eat vegetables.

On leaving the building after the cabinet made its decision, I spotted an official in another meeting room with a bottle of supermarket milk on the table beside him, rather highlighting that the council was hardly making an effort to support local farmers before today, and it was only the mention of plant-based food that got the local animal farmers so worked up. With the matter finally settled and the motion passed, this moron is going to celebrate with a nice lump of tofu.

Claire Hamlett is a freelance journalist, writer and regular contributor at Surge. Based in Oxford, UK, Claire tells stories that challenge systemic exploitation of and disregard for animals and the environment and that point to a better way of doing things.

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