Michael Gove has warned the government against dropping or diluting his “green Brexit” plans to reform billions of pounds in agricultural subsidies by rewarding farmers for environmental improvements rather than how much land they own.
The former environment secretary, along with other Tory MPs, countryside business groups and free-market think tanks, said that ditching the farming subsidies would squander a “once-in-a-generation” opportunity to make the industry “more productive, resilient, and sustainable”.
Gove’s intervention, in a letter to The Times today, is significant because he was a principal architect of the reforms. It also shows the backlash against any threat to the new subsidy regime for England has broadened to senior Conservative figures as well as green groups.
Conservationists have already reacted angrily to the promise
