The Lord confronts the brothers Brigham by John Vidal
5.09am
Rosy-fingered dawn in the east, deep peace on the Norfolk land, three crows heading west in a lazy flap and a meticulously planned Greenpeace raid on the third of Britain's seven GM farm trial sites is about to go horribly wrong.
Little does Lord Melchett, Norfolk farmer and executive director of the environment group know, but - even as he and his colleagues are heading for rural Lyng with a mechanical mower, bent on doing irreparable damage to a six-acre field of maize - the three Brigham brothers are pulling on their trousers in Walnut Tree Farm.
For five minutes the Greenpeace raid proceeds calmly. A rabbit lopes across the adjoining field. Birds sing. Melchett and the environmentalists cut their way noiselessly into the locked field where the 6ft-high crop is about to flower and spread its pollen. They couple up their farm machinery and block the entrance to the field with a three-tonne truck. Meanwhile,
30 volunteers in white decontamination suits decant out of minivans, and silently start pulling down the maize.
After a few hitches the Melchett machine is ready. Its mighty 4ft blades spin and it sets off at 25mph in a great clockwise arc, leaving a trail of sheared maize around the field. Twenty undisturbed minutes and the government trial crop planted under contract to the Norfolk-based GM company AgrEvo will be history.
5.25
Enter William Brigham, landowner, former chair of Norfolk National Farmers' Union and senior member of a family that has been farming the land for almost 300 years.
"Oi! Oi! You. What are you doing?" he yells. "Why are you doing this? You, you're a criminal. What are you doing?" The Melchett machine roars past him as the Greenpeace volunteers load the cut crop into bags and put it into their truck. Round one to Greenpeace.
Enter Lord Melchett in white suit:
"Look," yells William. "It's Lord ******* Melchett. You're a right democrat you are."
"Yes, we're just doing what people want," the activist replies.
This trial, he says, is not scientific and not wanted. This variety of maize crop threatens to pollute the land, he says. More than 120 villagers turned up to debate the issue last week, he says, "and most were against it". He adds that the maize was about to flower and pollute nearby crops.
William is furious, arguing that he has local support, too. His family have been farming here for 300 years, he says. Round two is drawn.
5.28
Enter Eddie Brigham, travelling on a tractor with a huge bucket at 30mph across the fields. Eddie's not a man for talk. He drives straight into the barred gate, knocks it off its hinges, rams the Greenpeace truck several feet forwards and barges a way into the field. He revs up, picks off Greenpeace protesters, and drives straight at anyone near him. The activists flee further into the crop.
Eddie spins the tractor around just as the Greenpeace machine comes round the corner at 20mph like a yellow whirling dervish. He corners it, slams his tractor into its side, drops his tractor's heavy bucket hard down on its rotors. It lies buckled. Eddie backs off.
5.33
Enter the police, running. "Right stop it. Stop it. All of you! Please all of you stop. Now. NOW!" yells their leader.
No one does. The Greenpeace volunteers hack their way deeper into the crop and unload three strimmers. The police disappear into the maize after the protesters. "Arrest them!" screams William.
Police (to protesters): "Right you've made your political points. I'd rather you stopped."
Eddie is still driving around and William is now almost apoplectic.
"You Lord Melchett, you're a ********. You ****. I'll punch that ******.
You rotten ******* sods."
Enter John Brigham, brother No 3, with Massey Ferguson tractor and bucket. He drives straight into the field and slams the bucket hard on top of the Greenpeace truck to prevent it moving. Round four to the Brighams.
William: "I should have put the bull in here last night. You ever worked on a farm? You ever produced ******* farm milk at 14p a litre?"
"Who are you?" he addresses me with a fist in the chest.
"Write this down, you *******. Blair is ruining us. Blair and his lot are exporting the agriculture industry abroad."
5.40
By now the police have arrived in force. The Greenpeace volunteers do not resist arrest and are led quietly out of the field like sheep in a pen. Lord Melchett is deep in the maize.
"[This is] decontamination of the countryside," he says. "It shouldn't be being grown. I don't think anyone should be arrested for doing this. We're doing something which the public wants and is for the benefit of the environment." He tramples the maize underfoot as PC 1123 takes him gently by the arm and leads him past William. William: "MELSHIT. MELSHIT."
He is calmer. "Write this down. I bet you don't. I find it amazing that a man who calls himself a democrat and is a former government minister sees fit to take the law into his own hands.
"I'm doing this for environmental reasons. The spray I use on my conventional crops is far less friendly than what I use on this crop. I wanted to trial these crops to see if there were any downsides.
"I see myself working for the community and agriculture in general. I voted Conservative! I feel gutted. This is the best crop we had. We even had a letter from Michael Meacher thanking us for growing it.
"You know what slurry is? Well it comes from the back of a cow. Two thousand gallons we put on that and just two pints of Liberty [the herbicide made by AgrEvo of which the crops are engineered to be tolerant]. If that's not ****** organic, then what is?"
His anger is now directed at the wider farming environment. He rages at me.
"Eighteen months ago we got 26p a litre for milk. Now it's 18p. To this business it means £65,000 to £70,000 a year."
One of the brothers tosses an open can of petrol into the back of the Greenpeace truck . It's John's turn to express his fury. He takes his tractor out of the field to where the two Greenpeace vans are parked. One escapes, but he rams the other. He then chases one man around the field, but gives up after a few minutes.
By now the field is littered with bodies as Greenpeace volunteers sit down, some shaken by the ferocity of the brothers' defence of their field. Thirty people are arrested, packed into police vans and taken to stations around Norfolk.
A spokesman for AgrEvo accused the protesters of trespass and vandalism, and denying the public the chance to find out whether GM crops are safe. Greenpeace in turn accused the company of planning to increase its plantings next year.
A spokeswoman for the local group opposed to the crop said: "People are very upset that the brothers consulted no one. We plod along doing the democratic things like writing to MPs and councillors.
It gets us nowhere. It's not surprising that people feel frustrated and take matters into their own hands."
Back at the field the brothers are restrained by the police, but are still furious. They reckon a quarter of the crop has been destroyed, though it looks less.
"Do you know how much work has gone into that? It's ruined. All ruined," says William. "This has nothing to do with genetically modified organisms - it's whether we want democratic government in this country or anarchy."
John Brigham later collapsed, due, it is believed, to the stress, and was taken to hospital. He was later discharged.