Jeremy Clarkson’s time has come

Philip Patrick I 20 November 2024 I Spectator World

It’s a reasonable bet that if Jeremy Clarkson stood for prime minister tomorrow, he’d win by a country mile. Some might even crown him the next sovereign. At the farmers’ protest in Westminster yesterday, Clarkson dominated the coverage, overshadowing even the other luminaries in attendance.

Several high-profile Conservatives were present, including Kemi Badenoch, Priti Patel, and Robert Jenrick, alongside Nigel Farage in bespoke country-gent attire and Richard Tice from Reform. Yet they were all eclipsed by a shambling, frail figure in a moth-eaten pea coat, faded jeans, and a beanie hat: Jeremy Clarkson.

Clarkson, looking every inch as if he’d been mucking out that morning, took on a smug BBC presenter, creating Twitter-ready content in the process, before delivering a short but powerful and humorous speech. Packed with memorable lines, his highlights included: ‘Sheep look at GS4 (eco-friendly feed) the same way a five-year-old looks at an olive’; ‘When did the BBC become the mouthpiece of this infernal government?’; and ‘You lot got a knee to the nuts and a light hammer blow to the back of the head’ (farmers, in response to the budget). He was the undeniable star of the event.

The idea of Clarkson entering politics isn’t new; he’s been linked to the London mayoralty numerous times, and a petition to make him prime minister once attracted 50,000 signatures. But with the success of non-politicians like Donald Trump and the rise of outsider movements, the time has never seemed riper for Clarkson to take the plunge.

Let’s face it: we’re sick of career politicians. They’re often dull, limited individuals with few achievements and little understanding of ordinary concerns. Marinated in progressive ideology, they make terrible mistakes and then refuse to correct course. Examples abound.

Clarkson, whether you like him or not, comes from a different realm – one where results matter. He has thrived as a journalist, broadcaster, farmer, and publican. He’s faced setbacks: binned by the BBC (surely worth millions of votes), divorced, and hounded by regulators. Like any good farmer, there’s plenty of dirt on him; too much to make him vulnerable to muckraking.

Granted, it’s hard to imagine Clarkson tolerating Westminster’s rigmarole, reining in his rhetoric, or subscribing to cabinet responsibility. And he’d likely hate being away from his farm for long or trading his Amazon deal for an MP’s salary. But Clarkson leading a farmers’ rights party? That’s conceivable.

The Dutch BoerBurgerBeweging (Farmer-Citizen Movement) offers a template. It played a key role in ending Mark Rutte’s premiership and opposing his eco-agenda. A British equivalent could target rural Labour MPs, pressuring them into a u-turn on damaging agricultural policies. Clarkson’s charisma, media savvy, and sharp wit could rally support.

Clarkson wouldn’t need to win a single seat; even a modest slate of candidates could swing rural constituencies and instill fear in Labour. Like Trump, Clarkson has name recognition, independence, and a flair for media. Unlike Trump, he’s also articulate and a talented writer.

So why not, Jeremy? At the very least, it would be hugely entertaining – and a great premise for the next series of Clarkson’s Farm.

Author: Philip Patrick

Watch: Clarkson blasts BBC in farmers’ protest interview

Steerpike I 20 November 2024 I Spectator World

Thousands of farmers descended on Westminster this morning to protest the Labour government’s new inheritance tax plans. As protesters brandished placards and called for the Chancellor to row back on her proposals, some rather famous faces were seen in the crowds – with former Top Gear presenter and now Clarkson’s Farm host Jeremy Clarkson amongst those spotted. The BBC was quick to grab the TV icon for an interview on the issue – but the broadcaster may have got a little more than it bargained for…

Refusing to play ball with the Beeb, Clarkson was fast to blast Victoria Derbyshire over her line of questioning. When the Newsnight host quizzed him on why he was at the protest – asking: ‘So it’s not about you, it’s not about your farm and the fact you bought a farm to avoid inheritance tax?’ – an affronted Clarkson slammed the ‘classic BBC’ interrogation. When Derbyshire asked where else the government should take money from to fund public services, the ex-Top Gear star turned to nearby protestors incredulously: ‘You hear this, everyone? The BBC thinks you should be paying for everything.’ Oo er.

Clarkson then turned his guns on the Labour lot, mocking Rachel Reeves’s maths on the matter and insisting she had plucked her figures ‘from the middle of her head’. ‘From the sixth form debating society she was no doubt a member of, which formed her opinions,’ he added, ‘and yours!’ Talk about pulling no punches, eh?

Watch the full clip here:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1858848536873279823

“So it’s not about you, it’s not about your farm and the fact you bought a farm to avoid inheritance tax?”@vicderbyshire speaks to Jeremy Clarkson at the farmers’ protest in Westminster where thousands of farmers are protesting the government’s inheritance tax plans. pic.twitter.com/9KwoiEbImz

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) November 19, 2024

Author: Steerpike

The farmers’ revolt makes me proud to be British

Brendan O'Neill I 20 November 2024 I Spectator World

My first thought upon seeing today’s revolt of the farmers was just how gloriously normal it looked. For more than a year London has been besieged by wild-eyed plummy leftists and fuming Gen X’ers screaming blue murder about the Jewish State. Now, for sweet relief, we get men and women in waxed jackets and sensible winter headwear taking to the streets, not to rage against a faraway land but to defend their own land from the grubby taxing of the Labour government. Now that’s proper protesting. It made me want a warm beer.

What happened today was extraordinary. It was a revolt of the sensibles. It was a mutiny of the ‘normies’, to borrow that condescending word leftists use to refer to anyone they consider ‘conventional’: ie, works for a living, is tattoo-free, knows what a woman is, and has never spent ￡25 on dirty fries in Hackney Wick. There wasn’t a keffiyeh in sight, just a sea of tweed caps and polite placards. ‘No farmers, no food’, said one. ‘Rachel Reeves, Queen of Thieves’, said an edgier banner. I bet the Met won’t have to scour photos of this protest to check for hate crimes.

It was first and foremost an uprising against Labour’s changes to inheritance tax on farms. From April 2026, farms worth more than ￡1million will be slapped with an inheritance tax rate of 20 per cent. It will be disastrous for cash-poor family farms. As one of today’s placards put it: ‘The end is Keir for family farms.’

But there’s more to this rebellion. It feels like the mighty roar of that other England. That England unloved by the metropolitan elites. That England that rarely troubles the idle minds of city millennials who never stop to wonder where the milk in their six-quid latte comes from. That England that is often the butt of jokes about yokels and improper behaviour with sheep. Today, the England of mud and milking, of planting and producing, rudely intruded into our complacent capital, and I for one loved it.

So much smug scorn has been heaped on farmers these past few days. I’d do to the farmers ‘what Margaret Thatcher did to the miners’, said ex-Labour spin-doctor John McTernan. Go on then, I dare you – pop down to the next farmers’ protest, truncheon at the ready, Orgreave-style. We will be very interested to see what happens. ‘Farmers have hoarded land for too long’, wails Will Hutton. The new tax is just the shake-up these glorified squatters need, apparently.

Peruse social media and you’ll see sniffy young radicals who only get muddy once a year at Glastonbury branding the farmers ‘rich and ‘reactionary’. The ingratitude is staggering: there they are eating a hipster burger with one hand and tweeting at the people who raised, fed and killed that burger with the other.

James O’Brien of LBC is the embodiment of the townie disdain for the revolting farmers. In his best patrician tone, gifted him by Ampleforth, he clashed with a farmer called Charlie on his phone-in show. He dismissed Charlie’s every cry of concern and suggested he just sell off some of his land, as if that’s no big deal. ‘Okay mate’, said O’Brien, superciliously, to which Charlie replied: ‘I’m not your mate! I hate you!’ Ouch. It was a remarkable insight into the cultural chasm separating the cosseted city elites that produce little more than opinion from the men and women who make the very stuff of life.

A malady has infected the influential classes – we might call it farmerphobia. They seem to view farmers as a blot on the landscape, both literally and figuratively. Farmers are seen as dangerous Faragists. As gullible fanboys of that frightful opinion-haver, and fellow farmer, Jeremy Clarkson. They’re the sort of ruddy-faced, country-ale types who – brace yourselves – probably voted for Brexit.

And they’re seen as polluters too. They’re forever being chastised for all those cows they keep whose farts are apparently dragging us towards the heat death of our planet. As that moaner George Monbiot once said, agriculture is the most destructive industry of all. Farmers are treated as borderline noxious. Both their conservative beliefs and their carbon emissions are talked up as devilish pollutants that threaten our world.

Farmerphobia is a Europe-wide phenomenon. Across the continent, governments are enforcing policies that seriously hurt farmers. From the punishing Net Zero policies of the Dutch government to Germany’s abolition of tax breaks for farmers to France’s reduction in state subsidies for farmers’ diesel fuel, everywhere one looks farmers are getting it in the neck. In Ireland, there was even talk of pressuring farmers to cull 200,000 cows in order that Ireland might reach its Net Zero targets. Sacrificing animals to appease the gods of weather – rarely has the neo-pagan irrationalism of our eco-elites been on such frank, grim display.

In all these places, farmers have fought back. And now they’re fighting back here too. Good. It is a testament to the aloofness of our rulers that they can be so cavalier about the men and women who make the food our nations need. And it is a testament to the spirit of our farmers that they’re not taking it lying down.

Author: Brendan O'Neill