Civil servants could be sent from London to the regions to improve rural services and put them more in touch with the people whose lives they rule.

Lord Haskins, a government adviser and former chairman of Northern Foods, is set to tell environment secretary Margaret Beckett that her officials would benefit from time away from the office because they have little knowledge of the reality of life as a farmer or rural businessman.

And speaking in Wales, Gordon Brown has also highlighted plans to move thousands of government jobs out of London and the South East.

Wales would benefit from the estimated 20,000 Whitehall jobs that will be moved to the regions, he said.

Forum Response: Countryside Alliance

Richard Burge, chief executive of the Countryside Alliance, told ePolitix.com: "Defra officials should be out and about in the countryside more. But if the majority lived and worked in the countryside rather than being part of an aloof London-based governing elite, ministers might be better informed and rural people more confident that civil servants were genuinely interested in their cause rather than their own careers.

"Of course, the Alliance has been proposing, and continues to recommend to Lord Haskins, that Defra should be restricted to policy making and negotiation, with all of its implementation work delegated to an independent agency which has performance and service delivery as its one and only aspiration.

"This independent body's headquarters and all of its staff should be based outside London and preferably outside any urban conurbation. The Benefits Agency, and its development in the past six years, has shown the way ahead. Rural people also deserve to have government services that originate in the 21st century."

Forum Response: Country Land and Business Association

Richard Jarman, head of public affairs at the Country Land and Business Association, told ePolitix.com: "I think that anything that encourages people who work largely behind desks to get out to the coalface and see for themselves the effect of policies that originate from Whitehall, is to be encouraged."