MORE than 150 dairy farmers joined in protest outside the Iceland depot in Middlewich and formed a barricade against Iceland lorries.


The farmers came from all over the country to take part in the protest as they continue to fight against significant cuts in milk prices in various supermarkets.


Paul Rowbottom, a dairy farmer from Stoke-on-Trent and member of Farmers For Action, said: “The supermarkets are so powerful and they think they can just kick us farmers and get away with it, but what will they do when there are no farmers left in the UK?


“There are a lot of people who are in a hell of a mess. I know farmers who are in debts of more than £1million and it’s not nice when you go to a farmer’s house and he’s crying at the kitchen table.


“For a lot of us this is all we’ve ever done, it’s all we know. But what we may be forced to give it up if this carries on and we just don’t know what we would do.”


The protest against Iceland, which went on from 8pm on Wednesday, November 26, to 1am on Thursday, November 27, saw the farmers block Iceland lorries with dozens of tractors.


It came after the FFA gathered in protest at the Morrisons depot in Middlewich the previous week.


A statement issued by Iceland regarding the protests states: "Iceland has not changed the price that it pays for its milk, only the price it charges to its customers.


“We are operating in the most competitive food retail market in the UK any of us can remember, and decided to make a major investment of our own margin to help our customers by offering them really compelling value on one of the essentials they buy every day.


"We do not disclose commercially sensitive information on the price we pay for anything we sell, but we can confirm that we continue to source all our milk from UK processors and reiterate that we have not changed the price we pay to them."