There is no shortage of candidates in the race to replace Boris Johnson as British Prime Minister, with former Defra secretary Liz Truss seen as one of the front-runners in the crowded field.

The right wing of the Tory party seem to be coalescing around Truss, and she has plenty of ministerial experience, including a two-year term at Defra. During that period, she didn’t make any great impression, other than a bizarre speech at the 2014 Tory party conference when she bemoaned the fact that the UK imported two-thirds of its cheese.

But the reality of Westminster politics is that it is far removed from rural life, and is dominated by the needs, aspirations and whims of the urban voter. The best that can be hoped for is that policies are developed that don’t damage the farming industry long-term.

Payments

To be fair to the Conservative government, including under the watch of Boris Johnson, it has maintained farm support payments post-brexit, and there seems to be little appetite to turn off that lifeline any time soon.

However, the outgoing prime minister leaves behind two important unwanted legacies.

The first is a trade border down the Irish Sea. In the commentary that has surrounded his planned departure, Johnson has been widely credited for “getting brexit done”. The point rarely made is that he achieved that by delivering something he said he wouldn’t do, and that was a barrier for trade from Britain to NI.

Hard Brexit

Johnson helped secure a narrow UK vote to leave the EU, but didn’t subsequently have to ensure the hardest form of Brexit possible.

The second unwanted legacy is new trade deals with Australia and New Zealand that effectively give both countries free access to the UK food market. A precedent has been set and others will want the same. The threat might be limited in the short term, but over time there is a real danger UK farmers are undermined by cheap food imports produced to standards that would be illegal here.

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