Farmers across the country have been in uproar since Rachel Reeves’s Budget. Just weeks ago the Chancellor announced that agricultural land and property worth over £1 million would be subject to an inheritance tax – sparking widespread outrage among family farmers fearing for the future of their businesses. Yet while Sir Keir Starmer and his Rural Affairs Secretary Steve Reed have been busy trying to placate landowners across the country, former Tony Blair adviser John McTernan opted for a somewhat, um, alternative approach on GB News.
Questioned on the impact the tax could have on Britain’s farmers, McTernan pushed back against earlier comments made by former PM Boris Johnson, insisting:
Small farmers won’t actually be affected by this change. This is clamping down on tax avoidance. I’m not surprised that Boris Johnson wants to support tax avoidance, but the Labour party does not support tax avoidance.
Farmers still get a privileged status for their farms and for me personally, I’m in favour of doing what Margaret Thatcher did to the miners… It’s an industry we could do without.
A bemused Patrick Christy quizzed the former Labour adviser: ‘So you would do to farmers what Margaret Thatcher did to the miners which was use heavy-handed police tactics, followed by putting them out of business?’
‘If people are so upset that they want to go in the streets and spray slurry on them, then we don’t need the small farmers,’ responded McTernan.
Oo er. It’s quite the take – and not one that Sir Keir Starmer is especially keen to endorse. Asked today at Cop29 what he thinks of McTernan’s remarks, the Prime Minister told journalists he ‘totally disagrees’ with the sentiment, adding: ‘I will do everything I can support farmers.’ Whether the farmers themselves are any more convinced of that is quite another matter…
Watch the clip here:
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