Recent contributions to these pages, one emphatic and the other rather obsequious regarding the never ending saga of the Freedom Monument is a good indication of how non Latvians feel about certain aspects of public behaviour in this country. For further enlightenment eight British soldiers training in Norway prior to deployment to Afghanistan have recently been sent home in disgrace. The MOD would no doubt have preferred it to have gone unnoticed. It seems our heroes got blind drunk during a pub crawl, stripped off all their clothes and proceeded to urinate over themselves and other bar users whilst abusing all and sundry. No doubt the Norwegian Interior Minister would have found similar words in describing the individuals to those used by his Latvian counterpart. "British pigs" in Norwegian anybody?
How worrying to see Latvia developing a pig problem of it's own. The rising cost of animal feed has greatly reduced the profits,already meagre, of local pig producers. They depend totally on what the meat processors - who work closely with the retail trade led by the large supermarkets, will pay them, which of course is as little as possible. But the price of pork and allied products continue to rise. And industry experts say that although supermarkets have recently raised their in-house prices significantly, only a fraction of that increase is finding its way back to the pig farmers. This is blatant profiteering at the expense of the consumer. Larger producers can claim generous EU subsidies but the small farmer is left to scrape the barrel as he struggles to even understand the array of forms which must be completed before he receives anything. No wonder many are selling out to the big boys and giving up the struggle.
...But for barefaced exploitation of the consumer by a monopolistic energy supplier look no further than Latvias Gaze. They have managed to increase profits by a huge 35.6 percent whilst selling less gas than the year before, capitalism at it's best, or worst. Welcome to the EU. But again - profiteering. Latvian people have enough problems trying to pay their bills without being overcharged for everything. Action by Saeima don't bet on it. Not when our representative Agricultural Minister, Martins Roze, comes out with statements like "increases in food prices cannot always be explained." Oh dear. Well, Martins, just pop along to your nearest primary school and ask any ten year old to explain it to you. It's called, again, profiteering.
And while you're there ask the same child to work out how much it would cost to provide all pensioners with half price gas or electricity during the months of winter.
Harry Gaffney
Riga
