By making Jeremy Clarkson their spokesperson, Farmers have shot themselves in the foot

[Coolasfeck]

JC openly admitted to becoming a farmer to avoid IHT. Why do farmers think having him as the figurehead will help them? Just because he’s off the telly doesn’t mean ordinary people will support him. It makes them all appear to be out of touch millionaires.

Feels like a spectacular own goal. Either that or the media is setting them up by making him the focus.

Quote from Sky News:

‘Those generous reliefs have made agriculture an attractive investment for those seeking to shelter wealth from the taxman.

Clarkson, the UK's highest profile farmer - and opponent of the government's plans - said as much when promoting his Amazon series about becoming the proprietor of Diddly Squat Farm in Oxfordshire.

"Land is a better investment than any bank can offer. The government doesn't get any of my money when I die. And the price of the food that I grow can only go up," he told the Times.

Mr Clarkson is far from alone. Private and institutional investors, along with so-called "lifestyle" farmers funding purchases from previous careers, like the former Top Gear presenter and his Oxfordshire neighbour, the Blur bassist Alex James, now dominate agricultural land purchases.’

https://news.sky.com/story/amp/whats-the-beef-with-farmers-inheritance-tax-13256257

Solar farms aren’t eligible for Agricultural Property Relief or Business Property Relief and therefore are subject to normal rates of inheritance tax. Many of the things farmers have done in recent years (e.g. campsites/holiday lets) to diversify their income aren’t eligible for relief. Why have they done those things? Because they don’t earn enough money from the land to pay their bills.

There’s an astonishing amount of ignorance on this thread. You can’t comment on “rich farmers” without understanding APR and BPR or realising that an arable farm needs to be 250 acres just to break even - and at current land values that would exceed the £3m in most of the country. Average farm income (not profit, revenue) last year was about £75k.

Farming families don’t have the cash to pay IHT, regardless of the 10 year payment window. Their only option will be to sell some land… which, given you need 250 acres to break even, probably makes the land they retain unviable as a farm. So, within a couple of generations we lose our farms.

Like everything in this budget, Labour have applied a broad brush at a sector claiming “we all need to pay our way” and complaining that people have been “avoiding tax” (when tax hasn’t been applicable…) when they should actually just be taxing people with the broadest shoulders. Instead they’re turning people against the farmers. You couldn’t make it up.

Farming is and will remain a special case. The threshold is higher and they have 10 years to pay it off.

He's using his profile/platform to highlight the plight of farmers. I watch (and love) Clarkson's Farm, and as time has gone on he's become more and more of an advocate. Fair play to him 🙂
I'm sick of seeing haughty politicians having a go at him, the odious Mhairi Black was on Newsnight last night sneering every time his name was mentioned. Horrible woman that she is.

They can. It’s called Business Property Relief and it’s now capped at…£1m. Astonished how few people know what the budget actually said. Business Property Relief works the same for businesses as for farmers, the difference is that businesses tend to generate more cash (to pay IHT), could take on debt (to pay IHT), are slightly easier to sell a bit of (to pay IHT) and are generally easier to pass down to the next generation than land as they don’t incur massive stamp duty bills and the older businessmen like to retire whereas farming is a way of life so older farmers tend to work until they physically can’t work anymore...

He's an odious man who has attacked women in the past for just existing.

I wouldn't be surprised if he had attacked Mhairi Black as she got lots of hate while she was an MP.

I'm actually more interested in hearing from farmers who haven't brought land to get around inheritance tax and to do it as a hobby.

3 million before paying if they are married, so only affects very large farms.

What if one parent is dead already?

Since they declare they will pass down why not pass that half on to children at death of first parent. The other half stays with surviving parent.

Farmers have profited massively from selling fields for housing making huge sums and want to oass that on inheritance free.... with a smaller farm.

Hobby farmers investing to avoid paying inheritance tax is a thing too... then the children can sell after inheritance...avoiding tax.

First post nails it as usual.

Labour have made so many huge mistakes and told so many lies, they’ll never get elected again.

Bit late for that if the parent is already dead.

Not so sure about that. I think Starmer's been pretty canny on who is finally having to pay for Brexit and tory fiscal incompetence. Wealthy pensioners and farmers never voted Labour in the first place, so it is no skin of his nose to piss them off.

We as humans only need 3 things to survive.

Shelter, water and food.

Yet people make a flippant comment about how ‘someone’ will feed them. Market forces will just drive the prices up and up - can’t wait to see the threads on here moaning about food inflation.

It’s the most stupidest, short sighted comment I’ve seen yet - and there have been quite a few!

As a country, we now have a policy which is not only not prioritising food, it’s actually creating policies to remove food production.

It’s quite something that so many on here are so removed from food production, they don’t get if it’s not grown in the soil, it isn’t going to be on the shelves in their local Waitrose. And what is brown, will become more and more expensive.

OP has a left wing axe to grind. Dressed up as mild faux concern for farmers and how they should organize.

Farmers don't provide shelter and water - the people that do pay IHT.

We also need people to teach our kids, look after us when we are sick, clean our streets, empty our bins, deliver our mail and care for our elderly. If we want services, everyone has to pay a share. Why should farmers be exempt? They are still going to get preferential treatment, yet here comes Andrew Lloyd Webber to moan about losing a cushy tax break. Heart not bleeding.

Perhaps you should listen to what he has to say and try to be a bit more open minded.

Wow. The flippant attitude to food production is astonishing.

We’ve learnt the hard way before, I guess we’ll learn it again.

Wealthy pensioners likely Tory voters.

Farmers definitely Tory voters. See the swathes of blue during voting in Farmers fields

Hear hear.

Select few gaining massive advantages as usual.

Me? Left wing? Not at all. Nobody fits neatly in to ‘left/right’ boxes. The terms are useless. I’m a self confessed Blairite. Socially progressive but economically more to the right.

Expecting everyone to pay their fair share into the pot is not ‘left wing’. In fact I was mightily surprised to only have discovered this week farmers were exempt and am bemused they are unhappy for their kids to now only have to pay half of what my kids would have to pay (I have over a million in assets).

Nevertheless, I was prepared to listen and could have been persuaded to support if a genuine multigenerational farmer had been the key spokesperson. I can’t take it seriously if a man who confessed to buying a farm to avoid tax is fronting the campaign. He’s also very aggressive. He’s clearly living in an echo chamber and thinks wider society will back him solely because he’s on the telly. It’s about as effective as Kamala Harris surrounding herself with celebs. Most people just don’t care what they have to say and they distract from the cause.

Spot on. 👏🏻

I don't see why farmers won't get support, there's plenty of interviews and media covering the every day farmer and their reasons are sound.

Plus your dc being subject to IHT is irrelevant when it comes to food security which is an issue for everyone.

Jeremy Clarkson is not an official spokesperson for us. That would be the nfu chairman and the head of the Scottish farming union.

Well it was a massive own goal. The Telegraph is full of headlines and pictures about the interaction with the BBC. Clarkson makes good copy but given his tax position it doesn’t look serious. People will focus on the exemptions. If the Tories are silly they will lead on this at PMQs. I expect they will.

People need to stop saying this!! 100's of small farms are worth well over £3m down South!!

The people who teach our kids, empty the bins etc. won't generally pay inheritance tax either. Farmers tend to earn less than teachers, but because they have an asset nominally valued above the threshold (a value that is only on paper because they don't plan to sell it) you think that they should?