Who is the Enemy?

I don’t know if you have noticed but the government seems to have declared war on everyone who owns or manages land in the countryside. The fact we were at war took a bit of time to sink in. The first shot fired (which was the reduction in inheritance tax relief) could, we initially thought, have been an honest desire to raise some more tax short term combined with a misunderstanding of how it would impact the average farmer. However the subsequent assaults have been planned and targeted and are hard to misinterpret; the refusal to even consider the IHT compromise suggested by the farming community which would have led to the exact same tax take but with no risk of failure of farming businesses. The removal with zero notice of the Sustainable Farming Incentive which allowed farmers to sign up to schemes to deliver nature recovery in return for an income. The announcement that councils can take any parcel of land they like the look of and pay only the measly agricultural price; regardless of whether the surrounding business will be destroyed.

What I can’t work out is who is the enemy they are aiming to destroy, and what is the collateral damage? (Spoiler; the economy, the environment, nature, tourism, landscape, food prices and food security).

Let’s assume that the enemy they are targeting must be the people who they injured in their first attack; that’s farmers who farm average and below-average sized farms, particularly those who are elderly, and especially those living alone. People who make under £30k a year and work night and day, hail and storm. They only do continue because they love the land and want to look after it for the benefit of future generations. Are they the enemy?

If not them, surely it’s those big baddies James Dyson and Jeremy Clarkson. But are they really the enemy? Say what you will about Clarkson, he has done more PR for farming in England in the past few years through the success of Clarkson’s Farm than the rest of us put together. And James Dyson and his 36,000 acres? Boo Hiss. Really? He is a responsible and committed farmer, producing the best quality food for us all, and is a leader in sustainable (nature friendly) farming. While the government puts less and less money into R&D, Dyson puts his own money into researching how we can make land even more productive, even more sustainable, even more biodiverse. It benefits us all and if this ‘enemy’ is downed, we will all be worse off.

So maybe it’s the vast landed estates dotted across the countryside. These estates are run to support our national heritage; Blenheim (a World Heritage Site), Longleat (safari park), Alnwick Castle Estate (Hogwarts in Harry Potter), the list goes on. They are hugely successful rural enterprises; take a moment to read their vision documents and you will see they are the lynchpin of our countryside. Employment, stewardship, heritage preservation, tourism and maintaining the landscape we are all so rightly proud of; which of those endeavours makes them the enemy? Yes they are valuable, but do we look at a successful urban enterprise of a similar value like Harrods, and think their success is unfair, that they should be dismantled? These estates are the backbone of the rural economy and our national tourist economy. They are our Crown Jewels, to be protected at all costs. Certainly not the enemy.

If none of them are the enemy I am starting to suspect it might be me at St Clere they have in their cross-hairs. No doubt the land and property have a ridiculously high capital value as Sevenoaks is a hugely expensive area. But. BUT. Like almost everyone trying to make an income out of rural land, we take less than 1% return on our capital annually, and most of that 1% we plough straight back into the land to spend on projects we can’t otherwise justify as they are not profitable; replacing the roof on the Grade 1 house, planting hedges, restoring heritage assets and picking up other people’s litter. We try to be good neighbours, we employ and house locals at below market rates, we pay vast taxes, we use local businesses wherever we can. If we are the enemy and the estate is broken up, who benefits? Who do they want to own the land? Presumably the land will be bought by a corporation that will want 5% profit to strip out of the land, and that money will disappear from this area and community and probably end up in the pockets of investors in Dubai.

It is all very confusing though, if none of us are the enemy, why the hell are we at war?