Jeremy Clarkson today demanded Labour ‘backs down’ over its inheritance tax grab as he joined 13,000 farmers and their supporters for a mass protest in London.
The 64-year-old appeared alongside his Clarkson’s Farm co-stars Kaleb Cooper and Charlie Ireland – defying the advice of his doctors to ‘avoid stress’ while he recovers from a life-saving heart operation.
Farmers arrived at the event in a convoy of tractors bearing ‘the final straw’ signs before joining a huge rally attended by the likes of Andrew Lloyd-Webber, Tory party leader Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage.
Mr Clarkson, who runs Diddly Squat farm in Chipping Norton, was holding a sign reading ‘With our farmers’.
Asked what his message was for the government, he told Sky News: ‘Please, back down’. And asked how bad the policy could be for farmers, he said: ‘It’s the end.’
In a second interview, Clarkson said Rachel Reeves has used a ‘blunderbuss’ to hit the agricultural sector.
Walking towards the protest this morning, Clarkson joked he was in London to do ‘a bit of Christmas shopping’ before saying: ‘I’m here to support the farmers, it’s that simple, because they need all the help they can get really, even from me.’
Asked about his comments in an interview with the Times in 2021 that avoiding inheritance tax was ‘the critical thing’ in his decision to buy land, he said: ‘That’s actually quite funny because the real reason I bought the farm was because I wanted to shoot, so I thought if I told a bunch of people that I bought a farm so I could shoot pheasants it might look bad.
‘So, I thought I better come up with another excuse, so I said inheritance tax. I actually didn’t know about inheritance tax until after I bought it. I didn’t mind, obviously, but the real reason I bought it is because I wanted to shoot.’
He said he opposed the tax changes, adding: ‘If she’d have wanted to take out the likes of James Dyson and investment bankers and so on, she would have used a sniper’s rifle, but she’s used a blunderbuss and she’s hit all this lot.
‘It was – as I understand it – it was a very rushed last-minute decision and I think we all make mistakes in life, and I think it’s time for them to say ‘you know what, we’ve cocked this one up a bit’ and back down.’
The Met Police estimated more than 10,000 people had joined the rally in central London shortly before midday – with “more arriving”.
Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the Conservative Party, led a group of Tory MPs attending the protest.
She said in a speech: ‘The policy is cruel it is unfair and it is going to destroy the family farm as we know it. That is why at the first opportunity we will reverse the family farm tax.’
Ms Badenoch explained that she understood the plight of farmers and described the tax as an attack on their way of life.
In an emotional speech, National Farmers’ Union (NFU) president Tom Bradshaw accused ministers of a ‘stab in the back’.
Addressing NFU members at Church House in Westminster before a mass lobby with MPs he said: ‘We know the horrendous pressure it is putting on the older generation of farmers who have given everything to providing food for this country.
‘We know that any tax revenue will be taken from our children and raised from those that die in tragic circumstances, all within the next seven years.’
To sustained applause, he said: ‘The human impact of this policy is simply not acceptable, it’s wrong.’
He warned the policy was ‘kicking the legs out from under British food security’.
And he said: ‘Our request is very simple, this is a policy that will rip the heart out of Britain’s family farms, launched on bad data with no consultation, and it must be halted and considered properly.’
Speaking to journalists after his speech, Mr Bradshaw was quizzed about the apparent impasse between ministers who are defending the policy and farmers, who say it must be rethought.
‘We’ve offered to meet with the Treasury to give them solutions to this, unfortunately, so far, Rachel Reeves has refused to engage,’ he said.
He refused to spell out publicly how he thought it could be resolved, but said: ‘I’ve given a heartfelt plea to the Chancellor to sit down with me so that we can sort this policy out.
‘The human impact of this policy is one I don’t believe they intended but the longer they leave this hanging, the more I start to think it’s vindictive, rather than miscalculated.’
Mr Bradshaw said the latest analysis by the NFU suggested 75% of commercial farms, over 50 acres, would be affected by the changes.
But Environment Secretary Steve Reed insisted that only a few hundred farms would be impacted, rather than the tens of thousands claimed by critics of the inheritance tax change.
And he denied that Labour, which has many more MPs in rural areas since the general election, did not understand the countryside.
He said: ‘This Labour Government has just allocated £5 billion to support sustainable food production in the UK.
‘That’s the biggest budget of that kind in our country’s history and it shows that we’re backing farmers,’ he said, and outlined other measures to support farmers on issues such as flooding and trade.
‘All of that shows farmers that this is a government on their side and the changes to inheritance tax will affect only around 500 farms. The vast majority of farmers will pay nothing more.’
Speaking before Mr Bradshaw’s address, a fourth-generation family farmer said there is a possibility he and other farmers will strike if changes to agricultural property relief are not reversed.
Richard Wainwright, 58, from Halifax, West Yorkshire, said: ‘We are talking about possibly striking. I hope it doesn’t come to that because that’s seriously going to impact the food chain.’
On the impact on his farm, he said: ‘We’ve got to possibly sell a 20% share of the farmland to be able to cover the tax bill. For us it’s around £600,000 we are going to have to pay.
‘It’s like I’m going to have to buy my own farm back.’
One tenant farmer who joined the protest in central London said ‘every single farmer’ in his area will be affected by changes in the Budget.
Daniel Spours, a tenant farmer from north Northumberland, travelled to Whitehall to protest against changes to inheritance tax and carbon rules which he said will affect the price of fertiliser.
Mr Spours said: ‘We are about £60,000 worse off next year from payments that have been slashed by the Government.
‘Going forward, there is more taxes to come on fertiliser that’s going to affect us hugely as well, so it’s looking pretty grim.’
Ms Reeves confirmed Government plans to introduce the UK Carbon Border Adjustment from January 1 2027, which Mr Spours said will impact the price of fertiliser.
‘I’m not a farm owner,’ Mr Spours. ‘I’m just a tenant, but we still will be impacted by business property relief.’
Earlier, in a radio interview, Mr Bradshaw accused Environment Secretary Steve Reed of treating the farming industry with ‘contempt’.
‘The way he’s treated the industry with contempt in what he’s been writing has landed very, very badly,’ he told LBC.
‘There’s huge mistrust in the numbers, even Defra and the Treasury can’t agree on the number.
‘Our numbers suggest that 75% of commercial farms, those farms producing this country’s food, are caught in the eye of this storm.’
In a separate interview, he told Sky News that farmers will continue to push back until the Government scraps agricultural inheritance tax changes.
‘This will carry on. They cannot have a policy in place which has such disastrous human impacts and think we’re going to go quiet,’ he said.
‘We don’t know what’s next, but I know the membership have never been so united in trying to overturn something in the time that I’ve been farming.’
Shadow environment secretary Victoria Atkins also weighed in today to condemn the Government’s ‘economically illiterate’ approach to tax.
Speaking after a rally of Tory MPs and farmers on College Green near Parliament, the shadow environment secretary said: ‘I met a Treasury minister and a Defra minister last night because I wanted to help them understand where they have got their figures wrong and to change their policy.
‘I met them in good faith, but during the meeting it became clear that the routes they are looking at, they’ve counted only two out of the three routes for tax relief.
‘What is more they have not counted – they do not know – how much the landholdings are, the farms are, that they are including in that figure that they’re bandying around.
‘So, it means that they are including someone who’s bought a paddock for their pony – you know, they’re not farming, they don’t rely on it, they are, if you like, a hobby farmer. They’re saying that that is the same as some of these farmers who are here today with hundreds of acres of working farm.’
She added: ‘What is so worrying is that the Labour Government just aren’t listening to this. They’re not listening to real-life examples that farmers are providing them with. I’ve met farmers over the last couple of weeks to talk about this.
‘I had one example where a farmer told me that his elderly father … is genuinely asking whether he is going to be a burden to his family and whether it would be better for him to pass away before these changes are made in March 2026 because the land value of their farm is worth millions, but the income they drew last year was worth £19,000.
‘These are conversations that are being had up and down the country on our farms, and I gave this example last night to ministers – they had no answer. That is why farmers are here today. In anguish, in distress, and some in anger, because they see not just their livelihoods today affected by this, but the livelihoods of their children.’
Shadow chancellor Mel Stride, who was also in attendance, said the Government had ‘broken its promise’ in imposing inheritance tax on farms worth more than £1 million.
It follows an extraordinary intervention from tech billionaire Elon Musk, who last night accused Sir Keir administration of ‘going full Stalin’ against British farmers.
The Prime Minister has said that he understands changes to inheritance tax are ‘causing concern’ for farmers but insisted ‘the vast majority of farms’ will not be affected.
Speaking at the G20 summit in Brazil on Monday, he said: ‘On the question inheritance tax, look I do understand that it’s causing concern.
‘But if you take a typical case of a couple wanting to pass a family farm down to one of their children, which would be a very typical example, with all of the thresholds in place, that’s £3 million before any inheritance tax is paid.’
‘And that’s why I’m confident that the vast majority of farms and farmers will not be affected at all by that aspect of the budget.’
The protests come after tax changes announced in the budget mean from April 2026 farmers will have pay 20 per cent inheritance tax on farms worth more than £1million – although this rises to £3million if farmers take advantage of additional tax relief measures.
Although the rate is half the 40 per cent rate paid by ordinary members of the public, farmers argue farms will have to be broken up or sold to pay death duties.
One of the protest rally’s organisers, Clive Bailye (CRCT), founder of The Farming Forum website, warned of strikes, blockades and go-slows if ministers fail to pay attention to farmers’ anger.
‘There’s a lot of militancy in the farming community over this,’ said Mr Bailye, a Staffordshire arable farmer.
‘If we don’t get anything out of Tuesday’s rally I can see things getting bad very fast.
‘If the next generation can’t afford to continue with the farming way of life then they’ve got nothing to lose. That makes them very dangerous – farmers have got the ability to cause economic chaos.
‘We’ve seen how European farmers have managed to get their governments to change policy. Talk of a farmers’ strike is really gathering momentum, and you could see blockades or go-slow protests.’
He added: ‘If farmers tip away their own milk, they’re the ones who lost out the most – but if they feel they’re going to go out of business then they may go ahead anyway.
‘But we don’t want to cause disruption to the public because at the moment they’re on the side of farmers.’
He stressed campaigners were not demanding a full U-turn, but wanted to meet ministers to discuss how to avoid the predicted crippling impact on family-owned farms.
Today, Downing Street insisted changes to inheritance tax are ‘balanced and proportionate,’ as it urged ‘caution’ around ‘calculations that are done based on the value of assets alone’.
Asked whether farmers protesting in Westminster had misunderstood the Government’s policy, a Number 10 spokeswoman said: ‘Farmers are the stewards of our countryside and we do not underestimate their important contribution to the economy and also our rural economy. The Prime Minister has spoken about his personal commitment to farmers, evident from the increased £5 billion support we’ve committed over two years in the Budget.
‘When it comes to the decisions that we’ve taken, we’ve not taken these lightly, but the Government inherited a £22 billion black hole in the public finances and we had to take difficult decisions to rebalance the public finances and also ensure we’re supporting the public services that everyone relies on, farmers and families in rural communities included.
‘As to the changes, we maintain that they are balanced and proportionate, and that only around 500 claims a year are expected to be affected.’
She said this analysis was based on information from HMRC and ‘the actual claims for agricultural property relief’.
‘We would urge caution around calculations that are done based on the value of assets alone. Other factors contribute to inheritance tax. .. that’s why our calculations are based on actual claims that have been made.’
The spokeswoman added: ‘We don’t underestimate the concerns and the strength of feeling, and we want to continue to have a dialogue with farmers and communicate how this works and listen to any concerns.’