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.

Yes this. So many frothers on here have never seen a tractor in the field.

I don't support them.

They have more generous terms than anyone else that has family business, large 'estates', 'homes' and 'art collections' that they want to pass on to their children.

We're not talking about small, family farms. We're talking about the conglomerates that took advantage when the change giving them the exemption came in.... Small family farms will still remain largely inheritance tax free under the new rules.

So to those who say farmers dont have the money to pay and will need to sell land or equipment etc, why do you think Starmer is doing it? To reduce the size of farms?

I think it’s a lot of fuss about nothing. It will basically only touch the very few and I really don’t see why farmers should be offered such huge tax breaks when no one else is.. Even with the changes, They’ve still got a very good deal. All the farmers round here are Tories. They like to hang on to their money. Most of them seem very comfortably off indeed. I think they will survive.

So much ignorance.

This!!!

Inheriting farmers don’t get ‘a tax break’ they get a noise around their neck and a lifetime job no sane person who has seen the options would choose. Now we’re going to tax them for the pleasure🤦🏼‍♀️

Of course they have options. Are you saying offspring of farmers never leave? Nonsense.

Very clear that some of you don't understand farms or farmers. Fine, no worries, you do you, but please don't complain when the face of the countryside is altered, your favourite jogging spots spoiled and you can't afford eggs.

If Reeves truly wanted to protect family farms and go after conglomerates all she had to do was extend the tax free transfer of a farm from a spouse to also then include a child or sibling. That's all. Family farms would be protected Ad Infinitum and businesses would need to pay up. But the reason she hasn't done that is because that isn't what she wants. She knows how much land value has gone up. So she wants to cream some of that off, out of the pockets of farmers because like a lot of you she really hates them and their values.

This is untrue. Farmland has become deeply attractive to non Farmers in recent years for the tax breaks and profitability on the land. The increase in land value is staggering and needs halted.
farming.co.uk/news/strutt--parker-press-release-non-farmers-bought-more-than-half-of-farms-and-estates-in-2023

Agree with both here

It's so bad

Our food supply chain will suffer and we will be more reliant than ever on imports

Then he needs to hand it to his son now when there’s still a reasonable chance of living for another seven years and the IHT miraculously disappears. It’s not rocket science.

Agree.

Not really, an accurate summary.

Every single small family farm which owns farming equipment will be liable. And who won’t be liable? The massive landowners like the crown estate, the landed gentry and foreign investors who will gobble up the small farms and sell them to developers for housing and subsidised solar farms.

Those of you who enjoy holidaying in the British countryside will moan but it will be too late.

The other thing that the government doesn’t appear to have considered in their petty targeting of farmers (as it won’t raise a lot of money - why aren’t they targeting top earners which would be much more lucrative) is food security. A country which is reliant on food imports to feed its population is very, very vulnerable.

Ukraine’s abilit to feed itself has been enormously helpful in their fight against Russian invasion. Under Starmer’s plans, the U.K. is toast.

I think they should pay tax. Like any other person with estates and businesses. The allowances are very generous already and few will actually be effected. And loopholes with people like Clarkson buying farmland to avoid tax should be closed.

I'm a Labour voter but this policy seems like a miscalculation. I was aware that James Dyson was buying up farmland which he could pass on without it being liable for inheritance tax, and obviously that loophole should be closed. However, a country that imports 40% of its food needs to encourage farmers - actual farmers that is.

Well said. Especially the last sentence

I support them, because I don't want a scenario where we have to import even more low quality food, or worse, have to rely on hormone fed beef, or chlorine rinsed chicken from America.

So who are farms selling the land to to make the money back for IHT?

They're already selling it off for house builders.

Farmland that is merely held, but not farmed, or that is tenanted out is seen as an investment and subject to full IHT already. This was a change of interpretation of IHT exceptions that came in under the Tories. The same goes for landlords who use agencies. If you don’t do the work yourself, it is deemed to be an investment, not a business, and is subject to full IHT.

It does to the tune of £2.4 billion in the farming support budget. We’re talking about inheritance tax which everybody else has to pay without a multi billion pound support fund to hand.

I support them because the goalposts have been moved without enough time to plan for the new rules. If you are an 80 year old farmer and haven't already passed the farm on to the next generation then it's probably too late to do it now as you may not live 7 years. Nor can you take out life insurance to cover the potential inheritance tax liability. Insurers tend not to insure 80 year olds against dying.

this