War, farming and food supply

[Lifeinthepit]

With the recent incursions by Russia into NATO territory, it got me thinking about the increased danger of war. Bearing in mind we have nearly 70 million people squashed onto this island that's a lot of mouths to feed if the food supply lines are broken (which presumably would be a priority target by any enemy).

With that clear danger in mind, I wonder how the government is encouraging and supporting our farmers and what measures they are taking to ensure that farmers continue to farm the land to produce our food. And also how they are making sure there is enough proper farmland available (and not built on or sold to Blackrock to be covered in solar panels) to potentially support 70 million hungry people.

AIBU to think that the Government are doing the opposite of making sure our food supply will be secure in the time of any war.

No, I'm not saying that at all. Wow your perception is slanted.

I don't care in the slightest about Clarkson getting shafted. I don't mind him.

I don't want farmers to be adversely affected particularly. But I've become very dubious about all this hand wringing and bleating from the privileged, ever since the scare mongering over private schools VAT.

There were many people claiming the collapse of modern society in a similar way to you now claiming the end of the world is nigh. And funnily enough, it never came to pass.

I'm saying if you want someone to blame, look at the people who have used this loophole, and put it in the spotlight as a way to avoid inheritance tax.

Yeah, rightly so, because they are up against such a level of bias in the media.

They are actually trying to sort things out after years of Tory incompetence. They may be the last chance in a generation to actually put right some of the glaring problems in our society.

Yet the barrage of unwarranted abuse never stops.

I'm neither Labour nor Tory. Yet surely anyone could see the mess the Tories made of Brexit, of immigration, and of the economy.

I just want to see a fresh approach. But if this fails, I fear we will end up with Farage, and he is just a populist. He won't achieve anything at all.

"Hand wringing and bleating". There are real world consequences to good people as a result of Government taxation that actually ends up costing taxpayers money.(Labour is run by the law of unintended consequences it would seem. Unless they do actually want taxpayers to shell out more as a result of tax policy).

Children who used to go to private schools and farmers aren't the enemy you know. Although some people in the Government seem to treat them as such.

The media go for anyone, partygate went on so long they probably made a fortune from readership. Sunak attacked for irrelevant stuff. The media goes where the public wants.

Labour are still getting it wrong, NI slumped businesses and borrowing is too high.

Okay, yes, I agree Labour aren't getting it perfect, but it sounds like this closure of the tax loophole was needed. It was being made a mockery of by millionaires, buying up agricultural land for tax avoidance purposes.

I'm very sad for family farms if they are genuinely affected, but its such a bad idea having Clarkson as their poster child. He is literally the reason that this change in tax has been needed. It's his fault even more than the government for publicising it as a tax dodge.🙄

But it won't help anything. Farms won't be bought by farmers as that would be madness. The land will be bought by Blackrock and the Qatar sovereign wealth fund (for example). Land is valuable.

And if Labour needed Jeremy Clarkson to prove that some farms (not many) are bought as a tax dodge then they really need new accountants. (Which they do).

You know that psychological thing where people live in different realities - this is how I feel reading your replies.

You're determined to be 100% right, and its slanted. But then again, maybe I am on the other extreme.

No-one said Labour needed Clarkson to make this tax dodge visible to the experts. But he made it front page news and he has made a fortune out of his TV programme, flashing it up to millions of voters. He is now spearheading the campaign , which reinforces the idea that this is a corrupt secret of the privileged elite, who have avoided death duties since the time of William the Conqueror. Everyone else pays inheritance tax, why shouldn't they?

I suspect you are personally affected, amd so I feel very sad for you if this is a legitimate grievance, rather than the empty bleating over the private school VAT.

I think its called cognitive dissonance, where by arguing such a blinkered position, you in fact alienate people and reinforce their opposite opinion. The country will not collapse, but if this has impacted you, I take no delight in that.

But blame Clarkson and his ilk, not the government.

No this isn’t right. It’s easy to see why Labour’s policy isn’t good for anyone.

I don't think it's constructive for people to use words such as "psychological thing" ""different realities", cognitive dissonance " or "blinkered position" "bleating" when arguing policy issues that you disagree with. It looks condescending and a little rude and detracts from the substance of whatever argument you are trying to make. I can't see one.

Not that it's relevant but I'm not directly affected as I'm a lawyer not a farmer but I live in the countryside. This tax on farming is wrong. I think counterproductive and at a bad time for the country which affects us all (as we all eat food. I'm assuming you do as well).

Hmmmm, I can see how my comments might come across as a little patronising. However, I find the idea of a straightforward right/ wrong answer a little naive.

I mean - it's clearly wrong for some people who had hoped to continue using this tax loophole.

It's right for all those who are currently unable to use this particular tax loophole to evade inheritance tax. Why should there be one rule for everyone else and one for farmers.

Its rich to say that I don't have a point when you've dodged every point I've made anyway and not directly addressed them. You've instead misconstrued them to grind your own axe against the government. Whilst sophistry might work in law, its hardly going to win hearts and minds. Nor is presenting Jeremy Clarkson as the poster child of the campaign, a man who has openly stated he wants to use this to pass his wealth onto his descendants tax free. 🙄

I think "hearts and minds" are on the farmers' side looking at the polls. Including well over half of Labour voters.

There is no contingency plan around food. Our food supply is massively at risk, it is being called out and ignored by academics and food chain experts who are asking for contingency plans. Food companies are huge powerful global investment companies, bigger than government. They are killing our rivers, selling us food that has no nutritional value and is in turn killing the planet. The OP is right to be worried. So many things outside of war can disrupt the food chain. We rely too much on supermarkets and they have no magic solutions. There have been many occasions where our supermarket shelves have been very sparse with no fruit or veg over the last few years & weather changes have meant farmers have lost crops or had to replant repeatedly in the UK.

Plus people would want their Chilean sea bass and Kenyan asparagus. Fuel rationing would be a nightmare since there are so many cars and our lives are based around road transport

Plus, if you compare to the Second World War, most homes in the UK had coal fires (no central heating) and people would just heat ine room and basically wrap up warm, taking hot water bottles to bed.

Can you imagine people now being told “You can’t wear that sexy vest top - you need 2 thick jumpers and no heating!”

You’re wrong! The government care enough to just keep everyone ticking over to avoid full out riots. Hence farming being heavily subsidied for years.
The government assume they will be able to continue to import cheap food to feed everyone. Which is great until it isn’t possible!
Farming and food production should be the number one priority imo.

First thing farmers need to do is to actually grow things people will eat, or can eat. A lot of our wheat is grown for beer. And a lot of the root crops are grown to feed to animals. So farmers would have to fundamentally change what they grow.

Supermarkets would have to accept veg whatever size or shape. We would have to eat in season. This would mean no fruit most of the year, unless you knew how to grow / store your own

Anyone with a garden should stick in some apple trees and get a veg patch growing.

Full self sufficiency in food would be extremely damaging for the economy.

If you stop importing food, you're likely to lose export markets too

Farming is far less financially productive than the services industry, to have enough farm workers, you would need to pull people from the services industry, cutting GDP

Imported food is often cheaper due to different climates

Essentially it's impossible, it's been impossible for 200 years or so. Successive governments have accepted this as a trade of in becoming an industrial and post-industrial economy.

What OP is doing is using this historic lack of self sufficiency to attack the government over it's tax changes to inheritance tax.

A tax that was in place since 1894, and where farms had a 25% relief during the two world wars. If inheritance tax was so damaging to farming, then the government would have suspended it for farms during the world wars. It wasn't set to 100% relief until 1981 for owner occupied farms

Sorry, just to correct myself, the 25% relief came in 1925, so between the wars

I don't think I am doing what you suggest at all.

Looking at the sums I outlined earlier in the thread, how do you suggest that farms that have been in families for generations can feasibly continue? Government IHT policy should not result in the bankruptcy of otherwise going concerns.

My point has been all along that to attack farming at this time is madness. The status quo in farming that you refer to won't be the status quo from next year. The tax policies of Labour are clearly disastrous for food production in this country at this time.

With the sums you gave out earlier, there's ways round it with decent tax planning

Gift the farm to children while you're still young and fit. Obviously sudden unexpected death negates this

Put the farm in a trust

If you can't do this, then it's quite common to take out a loan to pay off an inheritance tax bill

There should be no bankruptcy

Giving away the farm incurs CGT and is often the owners only source of income. You're relying on your child not to get divorced and your farm be up for grabs in their divorce estate. You have to live for 7 years but isn't Rachel Reeves considering removing this relief too?

Trusts are a way forward but firstly they are expensive and complicated plus there are 10 year charges. Its the end of the family owned farm. (And businesses btw).

Life assurance on IHT has many variables and is expensive particularly if you are only making £50,000 profit on which you need to pay income tax and live off.

"There should be no bankruptcy". People in government need to start listening to what people who actually know what they are talking about (no one in government) are saying about the effect of IHT on farming.

In amy event, all of the above are an impediment to food production not a positive in a time of potential war (which still remains my point). Charging IHT on assets that are not currently chargeable is not a good idea at this current time.

As someone brought up on a family farm (not a huge agri-business) - being a small farmer isn’t like other jobs. You’d never get people to put in the hours and commitment all round the clock that farmers have to for the money they earn. Please don’t make the mistake of thinking all farms are like the vast rolling acres you see in E Anglia, some parts of the Cotswolds or Wiltshire. Many are clinging on by their fingernails, especially in upland areas.

Owning the farm is the only real motivator - if you didn’t, you’d just pack up and get a job with better conditions and pay. Farmers have often inherited their land from several previous generations and feel a strong bond to it. It’s hard to explain but it’s not just about money. Land needs nurturing for the future, not just exploiting, and if you own it you’ll take care of it.

France, for eg, absolutely prioritises its small family farmers because it values their role in vital food production. I’m concerned about some utterances and policies from the government which imply that they see these farms as highly dispensable. I’m no Clarkson fan (I’m really not!) but even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

None of which is wrong.

However no matter how right you are, it is physically impossible for the UK to become self sufficient in food. And anyone who pretends otherwise is up to a grift.

If we had only just stopped being self sufficient - say 10, 15 years ago - then yes. Go for it.

But it's not 10,15 years. It's 200 years. It would take decades to reverse that with a wartime style application for every single day of it. Forget conscripting soldiers, you'd need an army of labour for farming. Even with tractors and machines.

I can't make it any clearer. "Food security" is not a synonym for "100% food self sufficiency", even if the reverse is true.

Very few nations are completely self sufficient in food. And frankly I'm not sure I'd like to live in the ones that are.

To the OP, there is a government policy paper setting out this government's food strategy www.gov.uk/government/publications/a-uk-government-food-strategy-for-england/a-uk-government-food-strategy-for-england-considering-the-wider-uk-food-system

All well and good. But Rachel Reeves's tax policy is a negative regarding supporting farming and food. Thats simply a fact. And once the family farms in this country go, they are very hard to replace. And a negative effect at this time on farms (which produce much of our food) is extremely short sighted if supply lines are broken. No one can predict what might happen. The Government is not making good decisions in many areas. Everyone is well aware of that and it's shown by polling and by their retreating from their decisions. So I personally have little trust that this paper will lead to a good outcome for us if there is a war. As I've said, much of their decision making is idealogical and run by the law of unintended consequences. There really is no arguing against that, unfortunately.

I'm sorry for not agreeing with people who are arguing against the farmers on here (the ones that are arguing in a reasonable way without being rude to me). I get what you are trying to say. I simply don't agree. Which is allowed.