Unlike our French neighbours, Britain’s farmers generally get on quietly with cultivating their land and raising their animals.

So many people were surprised at the force of feeling demonstrated in London when farmers protested about the death tax the Labour Government plans to impose on them.

It was no surprise to those of us in rural communities.

The decision to levy inheritance tax on family farms not only threatens their ability to pass on their land to their sons and daughters, but it also jeopardises our food security, the protection of our countryside and our rural way of life.

That's why I will wholeheartedly support a Notice of Motion in the county council this week calling on the Government to axe the tax.

The motion has been proposed by my Conservative Cabinet colleague Lois Samuel, who represents the Okehampton Rural seat.

You might say the county council can’t change this iniquitous tax.

But I want Devon to send a strong message to the Government: "We are fully behind our family farmers and committed to preserving our rural communities and their way of life."

I’m sure few people will disagree with the Government’s stated intention of bringing the very wealthy people who buy up land as a tax dodge within the taxation system.

But this proposal is also an attack on the thousands of farmers who work hard every day of the year to put food on our tables and just want to pass on their farms to their children.

But what can you expect from such rural experts as Rachel Reeves, who represents Leeds, the Agriculture Secretary Steve Reed from Streatham and Keir Starmer from the deeply rural constituency of St Pancras?

Indeed, Mr Reed is reported to have told representatives from the NFU before the election that Labour had no plans to introduce such a tax.

I can only agree with the Labour peer Baroness Mallalieu, who has a farm just over the border on Exmoor.

She says the decision smells of incompetence and points out that Government departments can’t even agree on who it will affect.

The Treasury claims only a quarter of farms will be hit, while DEFRA statistics suggest around two-thirds of farm businesses are over the new IHT threshold. Some difference.

Some facts aren’t in dispute. A House of Commons briefing paper shows Devon has more than 8,500 agricultural holdings.

More than 1.2 million acres of our countryside is farmed, with 145,707 acres in Eastern Devon and 189,554 acres in Mid Devon.

Nearly 20,000 people in Devon work on farms in either a full or part-time capacity.

And many more thousands of our residents work in the rural economy, supplying and supporting our farmers.

So this isn’t just a Labour attack on our farmers, it’s an assault on our vital rural economy and the way of life in our countryside.

Farmers shape how our countryside looks and our beautiful environment that millions of visitors come to Devon to enjoy every year.

This tax raid is estimated to leave the average farming family with a tax bill of at least £240,000.

That’ll force many of them to sell off some of their land or close entirely.

And who do the Government think will buy that land – the very billionaires they were trying to target?

And smaller farms will provide lower incomes, leading us into a vicious downward spiral.

So much for food security, which is ever more vital for us with Putin’s war on Ukraine – one of the breadbaskets of Europe – and the conflict in the Middle East.