ROBERT HARDMAN: 'Starmer the Farmer Harmer' rose the chant from green-clad rural army

You could hardly have asked for a more old-fashioned protest outside the gates of Downing Street: everyone thanking the police, everyone doffing their caps at the capital’s war memorials, everyone being so frightfully well-behaved that, upon being asked not to march up to Parliament Square owing to sheer pressure of numbers, all very courteously complied. Robert Hardman joined farmers at the farmers protest in Whitehall, London Farmers protest in central London over the changes to inheritance tax rules in the recent budget which introduce new taxes on farms worth more than £1 million Tory leader Kemi Badenoch was among those present at today's rally in Westminster Contrary to Labour’s insistence that only a wealthy handful will be hit by its proposed removal of inheritance tax relief on farms, yesterday’s green-clad army were adamant that it will decimate the industry. ‘We ordered this so everyone could feel at home,’ declared Olly Harrison, one of the five activist farmers behind the rally. A protest attendee with a sign reading 'please Mr Starmer I want to be a farmer' The protest is the biggest so far against the new Labour government Jeremy Clarkson attended the protest and was seen holding a sign reading 'With our farmers' Farmers have vowed to continue the protests until Sir Keir Starmer agrees to ditch the policy At one point, after paramedics were summoned to treat someone who had collapsed in the crowd, it transpired that the poor chap had ‘overheated’. The politicians, it must be said, were largely incidental, though farming Labour peer Baroness Mallalieu got a barnstormer for saying: ‘I’m ashamed and embarrassed that the Government I support is treating you so shabbily!’ Farmers arriving at Westminster in their tractors for today's protest against Labour's inheritance tax grab A tractor with a sign reading 'no farmers, no food' Early on, I spotted celebrity farmyard hero Jeremy Clarkson making slow but happy progress through crowds of well-wishers and selfie-hunters.