New import law or gossip?

[Zoom]

Thanks el48tel, (ignoring the BBC politics & background noises) that was interesting

[Zoom]

MatDz, I've just looked at your link after watching the BBC feature posted by el48tel. It was very interesting and makes me think that the EU employ officiously bureaucratic Vogons

[MatDz]

[...] the EU employ officiously bureaucratic Vogons

My understanding is that the issue here really sits on the other side of the border, but geography aside, it's all a joke really.

[Stuart]

It's the same problem that I've had with bringing tissue-culture Aloes back from the US. When Aloes like Pink Blush etc were new and first available in the US, I needed CITES permits to import them, permits needed both to export from the US and import into the UK. That's because all Aloes excluding Aloe Vera, are considered endangered and on the CITES list. The fact that these are lab-cloned hybrids that can be produced in their thousands and that don't exist in habitat doesn't stop them being considered 'endangered species' as far as the CITES rules go.
Another interesting aspect of this is that a nursery displaying at Chelsea can't put on a display because the plants on their display are being bought in from the EU. At least when Southfields did their impressive Chelsea displays, all their plants were grown on the nursery.

Stuart

[MatDz]

[...] Another interesting aspect of this is that a nursery displaying at Chelsea can't put on a display because the plants on their display are being bought in from the EU. At least when Southfields did their impressive Chelsea displays, all their plants were grown on the nursery.

Stuart

According to Wack's note shared earlier, them pulling out of Chelsea was caused by a lack of adequate amount of sales plants for a show this size, which they cannot grow in-house:

[...] Because of this, we had no option but to pull out of Chelsea Flower Show. We are after all a commercial business, and without plants to sell, there is no justification to have the expense of being in London [...]

As you wrote, applying a blanket legislation for tissue cultured or own seed grown plants is ridiculous, and when one combines this with outdated software and untrained staff not much is left other than for the proverbial to hit the fan.