Farmers at ‘Breaking point’ set stage for new protests over inheritance tax reforms
Protests will take place across the country on Saturday as farmers step up their campaign against the UK Government’s controversial inheritance tax reforms.
The National Farmers Union (NFU) warned that many farmers were at “breaking point” and could not afford increased bills.
Petition
A petition signed by more than 270,000 members of the public was handed in to 10 Downing Street by NFU president Tom Bradshaw and NFU Cymru president Aled Jones on Friday, urging the Government to ditch what they described as the “devastating family farm tax”.
The NFU is staging a series of events on Saturday as part of a so-called National Day of Unity.
Farmers say they want to thank the British public for their support and warn of the impact of the planned reforms to inheritance tax for farming businesses.
“After decades of tightening margins, record inflation, increased production costs and extreme weather, many farmers and growers are at breaking point and simply will not be able to afford the increased tax bill they will now face,” said the NFU.
“With the likely loss of family farm businesses as a result of this tax, alongside increases in employment costs also announced in the Budget, there is a real risk to UK food production.”
Statement
In a statement, the four presidents of the UK farming unions said: “The public in huge numbers, more than 270,000, have signed this family farm tax petition expressing their anger and frustration at the utter contempt shown by the government for the people who produce the nation’s food.
“It gives us great strength to know that the public are backing British farming at this critical moment in time.
“The industry is not taking this lying down. The government has woken a sleeping giant, as our mass lobby of MPs in Westminster and the farmer-led rally in Whitehall have demonstrated.
“The National Day of Unity provides another opportunity to call on the Government to overturn this abhorrent policy.
“It’s a day to come together for everyone who believes that Britain’s family farms, and the high-quality food they produce, deserve better.
“Farmers at events across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland will be on hand to speak with the public to explain why changes to Agriculture Property Relief (APR) and Business Property Relief (BPR) stand to punish food-producing businesses, destroying generations of work from hard-pressed farming families and changing the face of our rural communities forever.
“We’re asking the Chancellor to listen to farmers and meet with us to hear and fully understand our very real concerns.
“Rest assured, the UK farming unions will not sit quietly and let this go – we will continue fighting because this is not just about our farms, but our families, our future and your food.”
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Wish I could have their rates if I were rich enough to pay them. Clarkson and Dyson must be thanking all the people standing up for thier money.
Clarkson and Dyson bought farms for cash. To obtain any rate of IHT they must farm and produce food. If they decide to exit farming they have to pay capital gains tax on the full value of the estate. Same as you. They, however, are not typical farmers.
“They” must farm it, or they just need to have sitting tenant farmers paying them rent when they buy the land and when they sell the land?
Rachel Reeves apparently said in Davos that she had listened to the non-dom community. Such better treatment to the real rich as opposed to those with land hypothetically worth a few million (but would never even be realised if it were a family farm passed to the next generation).
Do non-doms benefit the economy? If global taxes are paid somewhere else and the riches are stashed in offshore tax havens, just being here can’t add much to GDP. Surely there’s no direct relation between where the super wealthy live, and where their business activities take place. If they want to invest in the UK they will do so whether they live in Mayfair or Necker Island.
I’m always baffled by conservatives opposed to inheritance tax. You don’t need the cash where you’re going, and you hate it when others get “handouts”. The best gift the wealthy can bestow on their progeny is the opportunity to stand on their own two feet without spending a lifetime wondering if their own success only came about due to the inherited millions in the bank.
My parents didn’t inherit until they were retired (and not enough to get to pay inheritance tax), and as long as we get back onto our previous pre-2010 upward trend in life expectancy this should be the usual expectation in the future.
I would think it would be better to tax based on the wealth of the recipient at the time of inheritance, rather that the size of the estate.
This inheritance tax exemption for farms is, as I read it, a relatively recent policy innovation.
Which leaves me wondering just how farmers managed to keep their businesses going back in, say, 1980, when the exemption didn’t exist?
There is something of a chicken and egg effect, where the exemption for farmland leads to increased land values, which leads to more demands for farmers to special treatment for inheritance tax. Whether that unwinds again or not, if the farmland exemption is reduced or eliminated I don’t know, because there are probably other factors at work.
Just to fill a knowledge gap. There was an exemption bought in by a Labour government in the 1970s in a bid to stop food price inflation. The exemption was worded as “land actively farmed”. In the 1980s the Conservative government then removed this exemption and replaced it with a 100% inheritance tax relief for farms. The current Labour government has now removed the relief up to the value of £1m (most family farms).
That’s a useful contribution – for me, at least!
Farmers are mainly Tory supporters do you remember them under the Previous labour government during the Fuel crisis blocking Petrol stations and every where fuel centres Tories through and Through
The government must bring in a clause that land that is actively managed for food production is exempt from IHT.
Meanwhile, the head of family farms should seriously consider splitting the deeds of their family farm into equal share amounts for all their family members. Their surviving family members will always have their share of the asset should one dies.
“Farmers” at Breaking Point.
There you go. Fixed it. Dyson and Clarkson et al are not farmers