TV personality Jeremy Clarkson has said that in the next parliament, he would like to see the government prioritising farming.
“We’ve been asked to diversify and when we try to do that the local authorities tell us we can’t,” he said in a video posted on Twitter earlier today (Monday, June 13).
“That needs addressing.”
The Clarkson’s Farm star said he recently sent the video message to No. 10 Dowling Street.
Watch the video below.
I sent this to Number 10 recently. pic.twitter.com/5WHXNwMYIa
— Jeremy Clarkson (@JeremyClarkson) June 13, 2022
Prime Minister Boris Johnson, also on Twitter, has replied to Clarkson directly.
“I hope very much that you’ve had a chance to have a look at our Food Strategy,” he said via a video shot in a cabbage field.
“A lot of that is about backing British farming, backing our own domestic food production, eating more of what we grow here.”
Plans for the government’s Food Strategy, unveiled today, commits £270 million across farming innovation funding programmes until 2029.
“But what we want to do particularly for farmers – and I know that you care about this a lot – is ensure that we say that when farmers want to develop their property,” the Prime Minister continued.
“When they want to turn a barn into a bistro or whatever you want to do, that we make sure that computer does not say no, and we help them – help farmers to make the most of their crops and their land as well.”
This may touch a chord with Clarkson as he has established, and continues to develop, his own on-farm shop: Diddly Squat.
Jeremy Clarkson
Jeremy Clarkson, a household name for many years now, bought himself a 1,000ac farm in the English countryside and decided to run it himself – and make a TV show about it.
The first season of what turned out to be the hit show Clarkson’s Farm came out in June 2021 and since then, Clarkson has involved himself in both regional and national farming issues.
Season two of the show has been confirmed, however a date has yet to be released.
In fact, farming has now become a key aspect of public persona, and is centre to a lot of what he writes about and shares online.
“Some days in farming are very good fun. Today isn’t one of them. Everything is going wrong simultaneously,” he said in one tweet.
In another, he shared an article about Oxfordshire County Council’s decision to only serve plant-based food at meetings with the caption ‘Madness. Utter utter madness’.
