To ask why you support the farmers, regarding inheritance tax?

[WheresFluffy]

Just that, really.
I'm interested to know why people support, or not, the farmers regarding the inheritance tax changes.

YABU - it's been done to death
YANBU - learning why people believe things is important.

I know you were. I was just asking what you thought would happen if, as some want, demand for meat and dairy products falls. And I explained, too. Do keep up!😂

Not a lot of grassland/meadow is suitable for arable, that which is, has crop rotation on it - hence cows. And you will be destroying the eco-system, and the habitat of many wild creatures. Not to mention making the landscape of Europe less functional, because it has been set to animal husbandry/arable for thousands of years and is at its most productive as it is. You could also be looking at increases in flooding etc, from change of land use as when forestry is cut down, or houses built near a flood plane (you don't have to damage the flood plane to re-direct where flood water goes).

cows don’t just eat grass. We grow a huge amount of food just to feed them. Without cows we could use those fields to grow food for humans. So even if the only option for cow fields would be re-wilding we’d be better off.

not to mention a forest is a much better flood defence then a field full of cows.

I agree with this, may I add with my conservation hat on that in the UK pasture is a way better carbon sink than woodland. It also soaks up water to help prevent flooding and traps pollutants preventing it getting into the waterways. Pasture is a giant green sponge it is very valuable to us and nature. Plough it up and we lose it and we lose it at our peril.

Pasture soils are often much more moisture retentive than arable so less suitable for growing a wide range of food plants that need well drained soil.

Plough up pasture and we lose a really valuable eco resource, we don't easily get that back. We are still living with the dreadful conservation issues of ripping out the hedgerows in the 1970s despite replanting some in the 1990s. Our song bird populations have never recovered. We lose too much when we fuck about like this on some experimental drive we already know will damage something, somewhere sometimes even miles sway

Tbh, our farming ancestors have discovered the most suitable agricultural use for the various soils, microclimates, and proximity to other natural resources. Why do we keep insisting they got it wrong and we know better. We don't, they nailed it.

its scientifically not true that open grassland is better for food protection than woodland. Land that is grazed causes soil compaction which makes it less absorbent and trees soak up thousands of litres of water and the roots build stability in the soil. Think of it logically, what’s going to use more water, trees or trampled short grass being munched on by animals?

assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/673343c479e9143625613548/WAW_factsheet_Nov_24_WEB.pdf

Better than concrete though, you just know where this will go

Sorry I got over excited about talking soils and was ineloquent again.

I should have said that grassland is better because it is a more reliable lock than woodland until humans happen to it. Grassland is a more reliable carbon sink than woodland because it locks most of that below the soil, woodland locks carbon mostly above the soil and is there for more at risk from losing carbon naturally.

Yes of course woodlands are better at absorbing water than grass, I didn't say they weren't. The discssion was about ploughing up pasture for arable use not woodland. Grazed grassland still has a good use for absorbing and releasing flood water. Arable creates a more compacted soil than grazing.

By us, very difficult to convert some farms to development …. Not all farmland is equal in this regard.

Can imagine farmer dies just chop up the pastures and sell to other farmers - so they can have extra to sell when they die.

They gifting 7 years before death is an odd solution. Your parents need to pay you market rent if they stay in a house on the farm. Starts making family situation a bit financially transactional.

Can imagine child lives on farm for free, then gets gift of farm and parent now needs to pay and is now “landlord” paying tax on the rent. Not normally how families get along.

So when farmland is abondened it will all become wasteland is what you're saying cos sold can't be used anymore 😂 Have you heard about rewilding?

*Just to be clear I'm not saying all farmland should be rewilded, or that its use should change, just that the suggestion that farmland can only be farmland is silly.

I don’t support them, it won’t affect the small farmer.

There are a significant number of family farms worth over 3 million.
What the civil service failed to include in the asset calculations was the value of the ‘business’ outside of the value of land and property. So….farming machinery could add up to way over 1 million quid as a half decent tractor alone is £200,000 etc.
The incompetence of the civil service with this lack of due diligence in computation is monumentally stupid! THAT is what we should also be concerned about along with food security.
Anyone remotely concerned about the cost of food, need I mention the Ukraine war and wheat prices went through the roof causing horrendous food hike prices; We need our own food supply and, like it or not, the stereo typical farmer with his big Range Rover, we need those people. To add, having read a quite a bit about Rachel Reeves I believe she has a deep rooted envy with anyone who has made any wealth, very very nasty quality to have.

Err yes it will 3 million is nothing stock ,equipment ,business and land

plenty of small frams will be affected

don’t complain when the price of food goes through the roof because of this

There are a lot of myths that farmers are wealthy. Some are, many aren’t.

there are myths that it won’t affect the small farmer. It absolutely will. Saying they can sell part of their farm to pay the tax is like say you can sell your living room. Or your liver.

Where do live? What is your job? How are you an expert?

But the reality is the purchaser of this farm is unlikely to be a farmer, more likely to be a housing or commercial developer, green energy etc who would outbid an average farming family,

Taking the land out of the food production circle for good.

We're only a small island, with a lot of mouthes to feed. And it's simply not sustainable to import all our food.

I read the news (from reliable sources). Jeremy Clarkson was quite explicit about buying a farm to avoid inheritance tax. Apart from farmers I also think the general public worry too much about inheritance tax, the vast majority will not pay it. I think more people should pay inheritance tax even though that would include me. Services need paying for and I would prefer accumulated wealth to pay for more and hard working people on average incomes less.

As others have posted this is incorrect, that's why farmers were protesting

Making the tied cottages a bit more transactional wouldn't be a bad thing. It is something Farmers are reluctant to tell the public when spouting working 25 hours a day 8 days a week for no money. Remove your house and utilities bills from your monthly expenses, and you will see a lot more in your pocket.

Jeremy clarkson is one person and he is quoted in the times (a reliable news source) saying he does not consider himself a farmer so let’s leave him out of this.

are the NFU and the farmers themselves who have received information from their accountants not a reliable news source?

I don’t think people want to believe it’s not true so no point…. It’s sad

@LittleMG
But they can sell the farm can’t they? The farms must be worth a load of money"

"But the reality is the purchaser of this farm is unlikely to be a farmer, more likely to be a housing or commercial developer, green energy etc who would outbid an average farming family,

Taking the land out of the food production circle for good.

We're only a small island, with a lot of mouthes to feed. And it's simply not sustainable to import all our food."
@magicmee

I think a lot of tenant farmers would be very happy to buy this land if prices come down.

From the times

Because we need people to.produce our food ... in our country

I wouldn't trust the NFU to have entirely unbiased figures. They are after all a union trying to improve their members position. Many of them very wealthy people.