To support UK Farmers: Part II

[Locutus2000]

Original post from TheHateIsNotGood 16/11/24

And due to KS's inability to face them in Wales today they are now thinking of going on strike. Because the govt are being too stubborn to reconsider how they apply IHT on working family farms. By all means close the loophole that allows the 'landed gentry' to take advantage of the agricultural exception but not with so blunt an instrument.

I was hoping to add a post to an existing thread but there isn't one despite it being headline news today.

Seems a thread worth keeping going.

My dad just bought a working farm. He's laughing all the way to the bank and us kids with him. Now me and my 2 sisters get his whole estate tax-free, even under the new rules. Until 2 months ago, he / we would have paid 40% on our family home, cars, bank account holdings etc. Now, thanks to farm IHT rules, not a penny.

It makes me fucking sick, even as it'll make me fucking rich.

The Labour government should have exempted farms based on length of time farming by owner. Then proper family farms would have been OK and they might have been able to get my dad.

@notanothernamechange24 the London wildfire you refer to, or Wennington wildfire, was started by a spontaneously combusting compost pile. A far cry from mismanaged woodlands.

We have also had significant moors fires I am aware of. Woodlands, not so much. For one thing they are usually damp. But I would appreciate data to the contrary because I don’t pretend to be expert on them.

@poetryandwine I said mismanaged landscape not woodland.

A self igniting compost pile should never be in the vicinity of sufficient combustable material to cause a wildfire - so my point stands.

And landscapes don't become woodland overnight. Areas will be covered with the likes of broken and gorse which all are easily combustible with a bit of dry weather. Doesn't even matter if the ground underneath is damp, if the plants are dry enough to burn it will go up.

• braken

The average family farm is worth around £2.7m, nowhere near £3m. Tax is only ever paid on the amount over the threshold, so even if you are £3.5m, you pay on the £500k, not the whole lot.

This is a fuss about nothing, stirred up by people who are still annoyed that Labour won, landbankers, and tax avoiders.

Go on strike … the small farms will take themselves out of business, and their land and assets hoovered up by the large scale, industrial farms.

The only people putting small farmers out of business are small farmers

The APR side of the business might be worth 2.7million but what about the BPR bit! The bit that the government is refusing to talk about. Because the BPR counts towards the allowance too!
And not everyone will be able to get 3 million in allowance. It's only in a few select circumstances that will. Lots the threshold will be a lot lower.

On Dartmoor, fires are lit to limit and control the spread of bracken. This is just to keep myself on the new thread.

Brexit.... hmmm. Eight years on I still can't decide whether it was a good or bad idea. Read Christine Lagarde's speech this morning for an updated view on Eurozone borrowings and declining share of growth and wealth. I am certain that the withdrawal was too fierce. I was in the (probably statistically significant) group that wanted to be in the Common Market, but not the widening political union and definitely was averse to the heavy-handed bureaucratic grip of Brussels.

Original thread. My bad.

There may be some single person farm owners. But they will be able to pass the farm on to the next generation now and providing they are a couple will qualify for the iro £3m threshold.

You have continually told us that the farmhouse is tied and that it must remain part of the farm. In which case it should be taken as part of the calculated combined value.

As I showed earlier, the retiring old farmer in most cases has moved out the farmhouse into a tied cottage. He has spent his life in a home paid for by the farm with the majority of bills included, which of course is a massive saving the rest of the population don't get.

I think I probably sat in the same camp as you regarding our membership of the EU.

As this ladies report seems to be saying, Europe is in a similar state to ourselves financially. My personal feeling is that many of the current economic issues boil down to the ott covid response.

Estimates are leaving the EU has cost the UK economy £140billion so far, now we can argue around the exact amount but its cost us many times Reeves "Black Hole"
Set to be £311 billion by 2035.

So next time someone bangs on about losing the WFA, Farmers and IHT or the reduction of subsidy to Farmers, maybe remember how much an ill judged decision has cost our country.

Since Brexit, EU economies have in the main, done better than the UK so the argument we are the same is incorrect.

If anyone can name an EU country that has seen waiting lists double to 7.6m since Covid, i'm happy to be proved wrong

You believe that NHS waiting lists are down to Brexit? Interesting theory. I've read otherwise re spend per head on health care before Brexit being lower here than in Europe.

@Locutus2000 thank you for the new thread

@ARealitycheck not if they die within the next 7 years they won't. And as farmers have been told for decades they were IHT free many have not felt the need to gift the farm early enough.

The farmhouse is part of the combined asset so I'm not sure what point you're trying to get at there?

Most elderly farmers DO NOT move off farm. And even if they do move into the tied cottage they are still a benefit of the farm and so still liable for IHT.

In order to gift the farm the gifted has to not receive any benefit from the farm from the point of gifting. Living in an associated cottage would be a benefit.

Also most farmers don't have a pension because they were planning on living on farm until they died.

Oh nooooo - it's turning into a Brexit thread. It's been really good to read some of the very informative posts from the actual farmers who also do MN, hopefully a little tad of what these posters have said has sunk into some minds.

farmers voted for brexit in no greater numbers percentage wise than any other profession.
Don't make sweeping judgments without actually knowing the FACTS.

Farmers are no more responsible for brexit than any other profession

Did you know that the farmers arranged a massive food bank donation at the rally yesterday?

Did you know that they spent time afterwards making sure that they area was thoroughly cleaned after them. They picked up all the litter, all the straw all the fallen leaves.

They worked with the met police to make sure the event was carried out with no trouble at all.

It was like they had never been.... only better because they cleaned up Londons mess too

Well done Olly and the rest of the team!

With the greatest will in the world, if said farmer wants a free fully paid cottage on retirement, what is actually wrong with him having to pay for it. No other sector would have a system that the business owner on retirement got given a fully paid for house until death.

If he didn't have the foresight to make provisions for a pension, again that is on him.

Keep posting info, good to see some on mn know what they're talking about wrt farming

@ARealitycheck how can you have foresight for a problem that didn't exist until 3 weeks ago?

This isn't poor planning on farmers part! They have been repeatedly told for decades that they didn't need to do this!!

@EasternStandard thanks. I feel a bit overwhelmed if I'm honest. I really don't think people have the slightest idea how far up shit creek this will take us!

I bet. Some of the posts are really poor. Labour will be stubborn but it's bad enough to see people just take whatever they put forward no matter what. Even when the damage is obvious.

I really feel for people caught up in their really bad policies. I hope farmers can push some more to get change

Farmers have always known they would/could retire. They invested what would be pension pots in eg sheds equipment etc as forms of tax avoidance. Forgive me if I have little sympathy.

I think a lot invested in barns and machinery not as a tax avoidance scheme but, um, to keep the farm viable.