Carmichael calls for cross-UK farm policy reset

Liberal Democrat MP Alistair Carmichael will use his appearance at the Royal Highland Show to call for a radical political reset on agricultural policy, warning that the UK’s food security is under threat due to decades of misguided policymaking and declining livestock numbers.

Speaking at the Quality Meat Scotland (QMS) breakfast briefing during the show on Friday, Mr Carmichael – who also chairs the influential cross-party Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Efra) committee – will urge political parties and devolved governments to work together on a fresh, collaborative approach to farming policy.

“We need to end the lazy consensus that food needs can be met through imports,” Mr Carmichael will say, highlighting concerns about collapsing livestock numbers in Scotland and calling recent recommendations from the Climate Change Committee (CCC) to accelerate this decline “nonsense”.

See also: Gougeon vows to protect livestock numbers in Scotland

“If food security is national security, then food production must be at the heart of agricultural policy – and right now, it’s not,” he will argue, warning that closures such as the Scotbeef abattoir in Inverurie are “the canary in the coal mine” for a sector on the brink.

Mr Carmichael, who has been Lib Dem MP for Orkney and Shetland since 2001, will criticise what he describes as an “age of difference for difference’s sake” between UK nations and parties.

Instead, he will call for the kind of cross-party, cross-government collaboration that has characterised recent Efra committee work. “We cannot carry on like this,” he will say.

He will also challenge the CCC to rethink its remit, saying it was created in a different geopolitical era and must now recognise that global events – Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine to shifting US trade policies under president Donald Trump – have changed the landscape.

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On Labour’s plans to impose farm inheritance tax from April 2026, Mr Carmichael says Labour backbench frustrations are growing and he accused the Treasury of failing to listen.

He said the recent Efra report, which received unanimous cross-party support, including from seven Labour MPs on the panel, is a roadmap for fairer reform.

“Industry is ready to be part of the solution,” he added. “But you cannot treat farmers as the problem and expect them to engage.”

With a crucial Finance Bill expected in the autumn, Mr Carmichael suggests the time for action is now.

“If the government wants a way out of this, we’ve already handed it to them [referring to the industry’s alternative ‘clawback’ mechanism].”