Boris Johnson responds to Jeremy Clarkson's call to government
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Clarkson’s Farm star Jeremy Clarkson, 62, has revealed what he really thinks about Prime Minister Boris Johnson, 58, after the Tory leader addressed him directly about his concerns on Twitter last week. Although Jeremy acknowledged that he was happy to see Boris making an apparent U-turn on supporting British farmers in his video message, he also shared his fears that the PM’s words were a “long way from any kind of action”.
The Grand Tour host cited his own struggles in his latest column.
He insisted Boris’ pledge to make sure that the “computer does not say no” when a farmer applies for permission to turn a disused barn into a bistro is irrelevant, as this decision is not actually made by the politician, but by a planning officer.
Jeremy divulged: “The planning officer wants to know, for instance, why I’ve installed a septic tank and what it’s for. And if I answer “recklessly”, saying it’s for the storage of turds, I could be fined £5,000.
“But this is the best bit: she says that, because we are providing seating and lavatories, the public is being “actively encouraged to visit and remain on site.
“This is what farmers are up against. Planners who grant you permission to open a shop and then say you must not encourage people to visit it.
“And what can one man in a field in Cornwall realistically do to stop that frankly unfathomable attitude?” The star questioned in his column for The Sunday Times.
Instead, Jeremy suggested: “This, then, is my personal message back to Johnson: you’ve got to announce that you will not tolerate a**eishness.”
It comes after Jeremy issued a plea to the government in view of his 7.7million followers, saying in a video: “Hi, I’m Jeremy Clarkson, and in the next Parliament I 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 – that needs addressing,” he added in the post.
It wasn’t long before Jeremy was informed that Johnson was aware of his worries about farming.
“Thanks for this Jeremy, the PM has seen this and his response is incoming,” read the message from Boris Johnson’s spokesperson.
The PM later appeared in a video filmed on a farm, personally addressing Jeremy’s worries.
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He said he hoped Jeremy was aware of the government’s food strategy, which promised to “back British farming” and “eating more of what we grow here”.
Johnson said he was keen to ensure farmers have access to the labour they need, and support when it comes to fuel and fertiliser costs, as well as access to “innovation”.
“We are putting a lot of money into new technology,” he continued.
“I have just been looking at a machine that can plant 150,000 cabbages, Jeremy, every day.
“But what we want to do particularly for farmers, and I know you care about this a lot, is to ensure that we say that when farmers want to develop their property, when they want to turn a barn into a bistro or whatever they want to do, we will make sure the computer does not say no and we help them.
“Help farmers make the most of their crops and the most of their land as well.”
Jeremy seemed content with Johnson’s response at the time, writing back on Twitter: “Excellent news. Let’s hope the district councils and the silly red trouser people now back down.
“Britain needs food grown in Britain.”
However, Jeremy’s latest column also seems to suggest that he, in fact, wasn’t too impressed by Johnson’s suggestion about the machine that can plant hundreds of thousands of cabbages.
The TV star penned: “Ignoring the fact that this isn’t a particularly impressive number, a cynic might say that the farmer wouldn’t have had to spend a fortune on this equipment had his entire workforce not buggered off back to Latvia because of Brexit.”
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