Dr Sarah Ingham is the author of The Military Covenant: its impact on civil-military relations in Britain.

 With all the green and brown waxed jackets, flat caps and tweed, Westminster resembled a sea of mud on Tuesday morning. Thousands gathered in Whitehall, where a huge tractor was parked near Downing Street. Sharp-toothed terriers, more used to rat-catching in Wiltshire, were probably eager to take chunks out of Sir Keir “Starmer Farmer Harmer” – as placards dubbed the prime minister.

Just like Jack in Jack and the Beanstalk, the protest against the Government’s change to inheritance tax rules relating to farms led to an influx country folk into town. With their streets cluttered with Chelsea tractors, Londoners were taken aback to see the real thing ploughing along the Embankment and Park Lane. Was slurry – or is it silage? – about to be dumped on the steps of Tate Britain?

Opposition politicians were eager to leave the warmth of their parliamentary offices, don their Barbours, and take the (photo) opportunity of showing they were on the side of farmers, the custodians of Britain’s beautiful countryside. How many of the MPs are also in favour of our pleasant pastures being destroyed by pylons, or have fought against the form-filling that makes farmers’ lives even more onerous?

Wallies beware wellies. A decade ago Owen Paterson, the Cameron-era environment minister, had the mickey taken out of him by locals for turning up to flood-hit Somerset in black brogues (“Order of the Boot”). Today, DEFRA Secretary Steve Reed is ridiculed for his choice of Chameau.

They were donated by Lord Alli, Labour’s Lady Bountiful. At £420 a pair, the French brand sums up the cultural gulf between those with real mud on their boots from milking cows and those who milk the Parliamentary rules on freebies.

The cynicism about politicians was palpable. Both Kemi Badenoch and Ed Davey addressed the crowd from a trailer turned make-shift stage, covered in haybales. Far greater enthusiasm followed the speeches from a fifth-generation farmer, a tenant farmer, and Jeremy Clarkson.

With Kaleb Cooper and Charlie Ireland joining the protest, the attention of Clarkson’s Farm and its millions of viewers will surely soon be focused on the idiocies and injustices meted out to farmers by national government rather than their local councils. Officials and councillors in West Oxfordshire must be relieved.

Just as Clarkson’s Farm highlights how spools of red and, increasingly, green tape hamper farming, the Budget’s tax changes are underlining that many farmers might have rolling acres but are hardly rolling in ready cash.

The exact number of farms that will be hit by the new IHT rules is a mystery that even the House of Lords Library seems unable to solve. It cites the Country Land and Business Association’s figure of 70,000, although Starmer told Channel4 News on Tuesday the “vast majority” of farms would be totally unaffected. The NFU’s Tom Bradshaw suggests that 75 per cent will be.

Given that the Chancellor is supposed to be in charge of the Treasury and her husband is DEFRA’s Second Permanent Secretary, perhaps the Reeves’ household, handsomely paid by the taxpayer, could come up with the answer for us.

“No Farmers, No Food.” The boxes of cabbages, Brussels sprouts and sacks of potatoes brought to Whitehall and destined for London’s foodbanks were a reminder that vegetables don’t grow in neat packages on supermarket shelves. Behind Clarkson and the other speakers, a banner stated #WeJustWantToFeedYou.

Instead, it could have spelt out Lenin’s maxim for government: “Three Meals from Chaos.”

Food security is national security. In May, the Sunak Government’s Energy Minister stated Britain’s that heightened geopolitical risk made it “more important than ever that our best agricultural land is protected and our food production prioritised.” But more of the “best and most versatile” agricultural land could be used for solar instead of food production. (Eh?)

This policy choice of heating over eating continues to be made by Net Zero champion Ed Miliband. In July, he approved three new solar farms covering almost 3,000 hectares or 7,300 acres. In connection with one of these projects, Sky News reported: “It is said Mr Miliband believes the need for decarbonised power ‘outweighs the effectively permanent loss of food production.’”

DEFRA’s 2023 Food Security Report stressed the “fragility” of the food supply chain which has recently suffered shocks due to the pandemic and the Ukraine war. July’s Food Security Index indicates that the UK relies on imports for roughly 40 per cent of its food. “Strong production [in Britain] mitigates international risks to supply and strong trade mitigates national risks to supply.”

Labour’s punitive attitude to British farming is high-risk. While the country’s supermarkets are a miracle of logistics, they rely on a just-in-time supply chain. One quarter of the UK’s food imports come through the “Short Strait”, i.e. Dover and the Channel Tunnel. Should Britain’s farmers get too uppity and start disrupting food supplies, the Government should not, er, bet the farm that imports will come to the rescue.

Instead of declaring class war on farms and farmers, policymakers should be celebrating them. Raspberries in November from Peru? Really? Discouraging this sort of consumption is literally the low-hanging fruit of decarbonisation. Local, seasonal produce is fresher and healthier: why isn’t it on the menu in hospitals and schools?

Britain’s food is safe and traceable: agriculture should be protected in any future trade deals. Prime farmland should be classed as Critical National Infrastructure.

“Bullocks to the Budget: We Need a Ewe Turn” is wishful thinking on a placard. It is unlikely Labour will back down: it is likely, however, the wider public will support the farmers. Back in the 1980s, the miners’ plight came to represent all that was wrong with the Thatcher government. Today, farmers could come to personify voters’ rapid loss of faith in the Starmer regime.

Fee Fi Fo Fum, I smell the blood is up of English (and Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish) men and women.

The post Sarah Ingham: Clarkson and the farmer’s should borrow Lenin’s slogan, ‘Three meals from chaos’ appeared first on Conservative Home.