Jeremy Clarkson rips into Brexit as the ‘biggest mistake of a lifetime’

Jeremy Clarkson is certainly never backwards in coming forward when it comes to politics. Now, the former Top Gear host has lashed out at Brexit, declaring it the ‘biggest mistake’ after Leave voters opted to withdraw the United Kingdom from the European Union in the 2016 referendum. In his latest column, 64-year-old Clarkson begins by insisting he can get along with pretty much anyone, despite differing interests.

‘I find it quite easy to get on with people whose views on life differ from my own,’ he declares, even extending the courtesy to the ‘Blairite lefties,’ explaining that his partner in the pub industry voted for Starmer. However, one group of people he will never agree to disagree with is Brexit voters. ‘It’s not so bad if they put their hands up and admit they made a mistake. But if I encounter someone who still thinks it was all a brilliant idea, I get so cross my hair catches fire and my teeth start to itch,’ he writes for The Times.

Clarkson states that ‘Brexit hasn’t made our lives better in any way that [he] can see.’. He proceeds to explain the difficulties he’s encountered travelling abroad with a film crew, meaning you must ‘list everything you’re taking and its value and its serial number.’. The controversial TV star adds that his anguish is only made more insufferable as his partner, Lisa, who is an Irish citizen, will often be relaxing in the hotel while he’s still standing in the non-EU passport queue.

One anecdote Clarkson shares is venturing to the Netherlands to make Clarkson’s Farm, which resulted in a long, drawn-out journey filled with checks and forms that made him want to ‘sit down in the gutter and weep.’. ‘I have crossed many tricky borders over the years and the paperwork always takes time,’ he adds. ‘But nothing has ever taken as long as it took us to get from post-Brexit England into France.’.

He also recalls having to wait for hours at both ends of his trip to Calais, despite no security checks being undertaken by staff. The former Grand Tour host even rages that getting from Iraq to Turkey and Rwanda into Tanzania was easier than leaving post-Brexit Britain. Clarkson concludes his rant by expressing solidarity with Lord Alan Sugar. He quoted The Apprentice business mogul as having said ‘the biggest mistake of his lifetime was Brexit’ and that ‘if he were Prime Minister, he’d crawl on his hands and knees over there, begging to be let back in.’.

‘I’d go with him,’ Clarkson declares. ‘Even though after two hours in a lorry park in Kent, I fear our knees might be quite sore.’. His latest political tirade comes after yet another attack on the Labour Government. Late last year, Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced an end to inheritance tax exemptions for farmers passing on their properties. The so-called tractor tax will see farmers’ agricultural assets worth more than £1million slapped with a new inheritance tax, starting next year.

Clarkson has joined fellow farmers in being vocal with his beliefs on the matter, supporting those taking to the streets in protest. Writing for The Sun earlier this month, Clarkson accused PM Sir Keir Starmer of ‘believing the government should own and run everything. Especially the land.’. ‘Nothing run by the government ever works properly,’ he blasted. However, Clarkson has also been described as a hypocrite in recent months after his comments from 2013 resurfaced, in which he admitted to buying a farm for the inheritance tax loophole.

Writing for The Times several years before Clarkson’s Farm took off in 2021, he said: ‘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. ‘But there is another, much more important reason: I can now have a quad bike.’. Then, after ranting about how inheritance tax would be increasing, he was called out, with his latest views on how it would affect ‘shafting’ farmers seemingly not aligning with the position he once held.

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