Sir, – I almost spilled the hauf I had administered to myself as a stress reduction measure after my day's farming, when I read the glowing tributes reported following the stepping down of QMS chief, Alan Clarke, on page 3 of your esteemed organ.

The congratulatory back slapping and high fiving, from fellow QMS salaried individuals was almost enough to convince me that all is well with the good ship QMS.

Firstly, I have never met Alan Clarke and I am sure he is a thoroughly decent individual. He came after a stint in retail via working for Scottish Bakers to trousering a high salary job at QMS. To describe his tenure as 'visionary' and a success, I would suggest is far from the reality of QMS members, like me.

How annoying it is to have QMS basically mark their own homework and consistently and persistently lecture us on the outstanding job that they do in the marketing of our products.

While I would concede that they have had some limited successes in marketing, when looking back since the inception of QMS, historically Scotland always had a price premium paid for its beef as compared to the rest of the UK. That premium has vanished.

Regularly, markets in England sell both beef and lamb at higher pence per kg and gross amount than here in Scotland. The UK national average deadweight prices are similar or higher, so QMS that's not much of a success story!

I attend markets weekly selling my livestock and honestly cannot say I have ever spoken to any farming colleague who has been happy with the performance of QMS. Most people I speak with agree with me and know fine well that if we ever put our head above the parapet and drew attention to our dissatisfaction, we would be liable for some sort of a sanction, or protracted inspection until we fall back in to line.

Last week, whilst selling my own Quality Assured stock, I saw similar stock with regards to their breeding and presentation making a similar price, both per kg and per head, although not assured. So no premium there then. Another success ... Not.

Sometimes, in a tricky situation, you have to look hard at how an organisation is working and look to where improvements could be made. I thought that was the chief executive's job.

Mr Clarke and his successor, which incidentally you mentioned he will be involved in picking, (I would have thought the members themselves should be consulted) must not underestimate how disappointed the rank and file are with the performance of QMS. They paint themselves as the farmers' champion. THAT IS THEIR JOB.

The reality is that farmers have been left with little alternative but to join this cabal and in doing so fund this gravy train and the salaries (which, incidentally, most farmers could only dream of) for no financial gain in terms of end product.

It is correct that we should all strive for the highest standards, but farmers need value for money and in commercial terms, if QMS was in the real world, they would probably have been replaced by an advertising agency a long time ago. At the end of the day, we need a QMS premium for our outstanding product.

We are a highly-regulated industry and the regulation is only going to increase. We need tangible results and a strategy to prove value is added to our products, not waffle from QMS.

Almost weekly we read in the farming press about yet another QMS success story, but the success stories that QMS highlight are generally individual businesses doing something special to gain more for their product and not something that was derived out of the efforts of QMS.

It is almost as if QMS is spending all of its energy trying to convince us, the farmers, that they are doing a good job, rather than going out to the market places and getting us a premium for our products.

All of us that sell prime stock every week can see the money gathered in levies taken directly out of our profit/loss on each beast we sell. We have little or no say on how this money is blown, but it doesn't seem to be doing much on counteracting vegan arguments, climate change myths and high welfare promotion.

Can anyone from QMS honestly say that if they stopped work tomorrow, that our markets would close and the value of our product fall? I don't think so. Our products – although at a recent high – are in reality, simply following the global average with supply and demand.

Last year, after a vote in England, potato growers, similarly disgruntled, voted to do away with their promotions body. And the same thing could happen up here.

I would invite farmers to google QMS and some of their top brass. Many of the job descriptions make the mind boggle as to how they are adding any value. It looks to me they have made up fantoosh jobs to soak up the levy money.

Farmers don't live in the dark ages, a quick look on YouTube and see some of the success stories highlighting our products. No high flying salaried executives required, look up Tom Pemberton, or The Sheep Game – real farming success stories that connect with city and country dwelling public from all over the globe.

Farmers are constantly being lectured by QMS that we must improve and be more efficient in order to have the pleasure of being one of their members. It is QMS who need to improve and be more efficient, and transparently show us where their premium is for our product because, at the moment, it does not exist.

In all my life as a farmer, farming has generally always been in some sort of turmoil and I do not suppose that will ever change. But as food supplies tighten, farmers should know that a quango they are financing really does do what is says on the label.

Is that too much to ask?

Name and address supplied