Jeremy Clarkson may have slipped a disc but he is determined to join some 20,000 farmers on Tuesday when they stage one of the biggest protest rallies of Sir Keir Starmer’s premiership.
The Clarkson’s Farm presenter told The Telegraph that he was “barely moveable” after a back injury but he hoped to “get there somehow”, though he will let the presence of thousands of farmers outside Parliament speak for itself.
He does not plan to address the rally, which aims to persuade the Government to rethink its inheritance tax raid under which estates worth more than £1 million will incur a 20 per cent charge from April 2026 when passed down to the next generation of farmers.
Buoyed by overwhelming support from the public in opinion polls, farmers hope that the scale of the rally will shake a Government that has so far refused to scrap its Budget plan.
Ministers have vainly appealed to farmers to calm down and look at the financial facts.
“I urge people to look calmly at the detail and I think they will find that the vast majority will be fine,” said Daniel Zeichner, the farming minister, on Sunday.
However, there is no sign of farmers relenting. Indeed, there are threats by some that they could go on strike in a move that would threaten the UK’s food supplies.
Rather than calming the situation, the minister’s comments appear to have become a red rag to the proverbial bull.
Cllr Tim Taylor, leader of Pro Farmers United, who besieged the Welsh Labour conference addressed by Sir Keir at the weekend, told The Telegraph: “He needs to look out. We are not calming down, we are escalating and will be escalating big time.
“Our industry will show Rachel Reeves and the crew who is in charge of the rural way of life – and it isn’t them. We will not be told by somebody from the city to calm down. We are going to deal with this and we are going to deal with this in the farmer’s way.”
The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) is publicly warning farmers not to go beyond lawful protests, saying they should not mount action that could “empty supermarket shelves.”
NFU leaders are sensitive to the risk that the strong public support they have could evaporate if they start disrupting people’s lives.
Polls demonstrate that farmers not only have the public’s backing in their fight against the Government but also hold a special place in the nation’s hearts – so much so that Luke Tryl, executive director of More in Common, warned the tax raid could become the Chancellor’s own “pasty tax.”
George Osborne’s about-turn over VAT on pasties has gone down in Treasury folklore as a masterclass in how not to introduce a tax rise.
“I think this is the pasty tax of this Government but worse because it has got a genuine visible face behind it,” said Mr Tryl.
He said polling showed 57 per cent of the public supported exempting farmers from inheritance tax when passing down their estates, compared with 24 per cent against.
When asked to rate the positives versus the negatives of the Budget, farmers, pensioners and small businesses were identified as the biggest losers.
“They are three groups that I would advise that you don’t want to end up on the wrong side of,” said Mr Tryl.
“Then there’s the other point that farmers do occupy a very special place in the public imagination.
“I did a focus group in Scunthorpe after the Budget where people said: ‘Why would they go after the farmers?’”
Polling shows the public set farmers very much apart from other businesses, neither seeing them as profit-driven or entrepreneurial but instead regarding them as “having local community interests at heart,” “caring about the environment and nature,” and being “important to British culture and tradition.”
A total of 80 per cent of the public believe farmers “benefit the country.”
Given the intensity of the passions involved, it is not surprising there is a whiff of class war and town versus country in the row.
It surfaced last week when John McTernan, a former adviser to Tony Blair, said he was in favour of doing to the farmers “what Margaret Thatcher did to the miners.” He said Britain did not “need small farmers.”
The claim was shot down by the Prime Minister, who said he “totally” disagreed with Mr McTernan.
However, Tory MPs who have traditionally represented the rural vote say it illustrates a disconnect between farmers and Labour.
Alicia Kearns, the Tory MP for Rutland and Stamford in the East Midlands, said: “They feel absolutely betrayed, and they didn’t see it coming, because Labour specifically ruled out and said that they would not do this. I think it does feel like David and Goliath for them.”
John Glen, the former chief secretary to the Treasury, said it showed how frustrated farmers had become.
“Traditionally the vast majority of UK farmers have resisted direct action. The fact that significant numbers are planning such action demonstrates how upset and betrayed they feel,” he said.
It is not clear how far farmers will go – and how many will join any militant action – to protect their inheritance against the Treasury. Recent history from mainland Europe shows militancy can have a dramatic political impact in persuading governments to change their minds.
In the Netherlands, more than 2,000 tractors created the worst jam in the nation’s history when they protested against new restrictions on farm emissions last November.
French farmers forced Emmanuel Macron, the country’s president, to back down on new green goals within days of bringing Paris to a halt with their tractors.
In Britain, nearly six in 10 of the public think politicians do not show farmers enough respect. Only five per cent believe they do. More than eight in 10 say they respect farmers, according to More in Common.
However, in a cautionary note to any militant action, this adoration by Britons has to be weighed against the public’s disdain for disruption, said Mr Tryl.
“If you are doing things where people cannot get to hospital appointments, you end up on the wrong side of public opinion very quickly,” he added.
So far, like Clarkson, most farmers are hoping that their presence in London will speak for itself.
But if the Government digs its heels in, more militant campaigners are likely to demand a test of how far the public’s goodwill really goes.
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