This month, Dr Neil Hudson, Epping Forest MP and Shadow DEFRA Minister, participated in a landmark cross-party roundtable in Parliament, highlighting the urgent need to tackle the health challenges that persist in rural communities.
The roundtable, convened by the Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution (RABI), saw Dr Hudson and other key stakeholders in the space of rural health discuss the inequality of poorer physical and mental health outcomes for rural communities and what can be done to address them.
The evidence is clear that both physical and mental health is sadly poorer for those in rural communities. Farmers are sadly more likely to lose their lives from preventable deaths from both physical and mental health difficulties, often due to those in rural communities presenting themselves later than those in urban communities for example, and fatal accidents being twenty-one times higher than the average across all injuries.
Dr Hudson has long campaigned as a Member of Parliament and Shadow DEFRA Minister, for action to improve the health of rural communities, alongside vital stakeholders in this space, such as RABI, the Farming Community Network, You Are Not Alone (YANA) and the Farm Safety Foundation (Yellow Wellies).
As a Member of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee in the previous Parliament, he instigated a landmark report on Rural Mental Health, which highlighted the urgent need to tackle shocks like flooding and animal disease outbreaks, as their negative economic impacts and destruction of livelihoods can create and exacerbate challenges to rural communities’ mental health.
In March this year, Dr Hudson raised this directly at the Despatch Box with the Government, challenging their ending of the Rural Resilience Fund launched by the previous Government. This fund was specifically in place to vitally support the mental health of farming communities in a challenging environment, including concerning animal disease outbreaks, and challenges from Government policies such as the Family Farm Tax. The roundtable Dr Hudson attended explicitly highlighted the interlink between the financial wellbeing of farmers and the impact this has on rural physical and mental health.
He has also repeatedly outlined the need for this Government to protect our dedicated farmers from the shock of animal disease outbreaks by increased disease surveillance and funding a crucial redevelopment of the UK’s biosecurity centre, the Animal and Plant Health Agency headquarters, in Weybridge. His latest intervention on this took place only this month.
Following the roundtable, Dr Hudson commented:
“We must have parity of esteem between physical and mental health and that goes for urban and rural areas alike. I must pay tribute to RABI for setting up this crucial roundtable highlighting the urgent need to address the challenges in the mental and physical health of our rural and semi-rural communities, as well as so many other groups I have been proud to meet and work alongside to address this issue, including YANA, the Farming Community Network and the Farm Safety Foundation."
“This roundtable was another stark reminder that the light needs to be shone on the difficulties our rural and semi-rural communities face in accessing the physical and mental support they need. I have seen first-hand how sudden shocks such as animal disease outbreaks, flooding and rural crime cause financial and emotional damage that can lead to compromised mental health. The Government must centre this vital interlink in its approach to shocks if health outcomes are going to improve."
“I will never stop doing all I can to address these challenges, and doing all I can with stakeholders to centre wellbeing at the heart of this country’s approach to our dedicated farmers and rural communities.”
You can see more about Dr Hudson’s long-standing record on this below:
Rural Mental Health EFRA Committee Report: https://www.neilhudson.org.uk/news/veterinary-mp-dr-neil-hudson-instigated-new-efra-committee-report-highlighting-acute-pressures
Dr Hudson’s questions to the Government on rural mental health and shock events: https://www.neilhudson.org.uk/news/shadow-defra-minister-dr-neil-hudson-mp-stands-rural-mental-health
https://www.neilhudson.org.uk/news/shadow-defra-minister-dr-neil-hudson-mp-urges-labour-act-extreme-weather-events-during-urgent
Dr Hudson’s questions on biosecurity to the Government:
Dr Hudson’s support for Yellow Wellies rural mental health Parliamentary event in February:
