Jeremy Clarkson shares real reason he bought farm – ‘I never admitted it’

Jeremy Clarkson has lifted the lid on his real motivation for buying a farm, saying he thought it would be a “better PR story if I said I bought it to avoid paying tax”.

The man behind Clarkson’s Farm, Amazon Prime’s runaway hit TV series, defied doctors’ orders to protest against changes to agricultural inheritance tax brought by the Labour government on Tuesday, taking to the streets of London alongside thousands of fellow farmers.

Clarkson told the Times in 2021 that avoiding inheritance tax was “the critical thing” in his decision to buy land. He also wrote in a post on the Top Gear website in 2010: “I have bought a farm. There are many sensible reasons for this: Land is a better investment than any bank can offer. The government doesn’t get any of my money when I die. And the price of the food that I grow can only go up.”

Addressing these comments in a new interview with the Times, the former Top Gear presenter said: “I never did admit why I really bought it.

“I wanted to have a shoot – I was very naive. I just thought it would be a better PR story if I said I bought it to avoid paying tax.”

Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced that combined business and agricultural assets worth above £1 million would be subject to 50% inheritance tax relief at an effective rate of 20% from April 2025.

It marked a departure from Agricultural Property Relief (APR), a policy designed to reduce the tax burden faced by farmers to reduce the likelihood of selling income sources to cover the costs. Assets worth less than £1 million still won’t have to pay inheritance tax.

Despite vocally opposing the tax changes, Clarkson told the newspaper that he doesn’t want to be the public face of the movement, saying: “It should be led by farmers.”

He said he doesn’t consider himself to be a farmer but feels his job is to “report on farming” and shine a light on rural poverty in the industry.

“One of the problems we have on the show is we’re not showing the poverty either, because obviously on Diddly Squat, there isn’t any poverty,” he explained.

“But trust me, there is absolute poverty. I’m surrounded by farmers. I’m not going out for dinner with James Dyson. It’s people with 200 acres, 400 acres. Way past Rachel Reeves’ threshold. They are f*****.”

Clarkson was also asked whether he’d consider entering politics – to which he replied: “I’d be a terrible political leader, hopeless.

“I’m a journalist at heart, I prefer throwing rocks at people than having them thrown at me.”

On Friday, Sir Keir Starmer insisted that his government was supportive of farmers and of pensioners as he faced questions about the tax reforms and the decision to limit winter fuel payments to only the poorest pensioners.

The Prime Minister told BBC Bristol: “We’re for working people who need to be better off, who’ve really struggled over recent years.

“We’re for everybody who wants to and needs to rely on the NHS, which is on its knees, and we’ve got to pick it up and we will and get those waiting lists down.

“We’re for the people who absolutely need somewhere safe and secure to live that they can afford. All of that has to be paid for.

“We are also for the farmers and the pensioners.”

He also repeated his position that the vast majority of farms will be “completely unaffected” by changes to agricultural inheritance tax.