Tim Bonner: Wading through these difficult times

Many rural businesses from pubs, to shoots, to tourist destinations are having to make tough decisions about how to survive the current economic shut down and ensure they will still be around when the world reverts to more normal circumstances. Each is in a different situation and none can answer the critical question 'what do we do?' for each and every one.

What the Alliance can do, however, is to bring together relevant information on government support which will help to inform those decisions. There is an unprecedented level of direct support available to businesses to help them and their staff through this most difficult time from direct grants and loans underwritten by the government to the employment retention scheme that will reimburse employers for the salaries of staff who would otherwise have been laid off.

We have brought this information together in our COVID 19 Hub with relevant advice for individuals carrying out pest control, looking after horses and involved in other rural activities. Again no one, including the government, can provide advice that covers every situation, but common sense can go a long way. The welfare of animals remains paramount and we must maintain our duty of care to any animals that our under our control. There are many people in the countryside who cannot do their jobs from home and who can easily maintain social distancing as they carry out their roles.

Others will be maintaining businesses that provide the critical resources of food, provisions and medicine that are maintaining their communities. There may also be a need for some people to carry out pest control to address an immediate issue likely to cause serious damage such as a fox taking lambs. Beyond this sort of necessary activity, however, we should all be heeding the simple instructions to stay at home until the outbreak is under control and restrictions are lifted so that our lives can at least start to return to normality.