At last year’s NFU Conference, we heard from Sir Keir Starmer that “losing a farm is not like losing any other business, it can’t come back”. He was absolutely right. It can’t.
But Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ Budget, in which she announced changes to Agricultural Property Relief (APR) and Business Property Relief (BPR), threatens to harm thousands of UK farms, damage family businesses and destabilise UK food security.
Food security is an essential part of our national infrastructure and the hard work of our farmers and growers producing food for our tables is key. By piling on costs – costs they will be unable to pay without potentially selling off the farm – is to the detriment of all.
I know you agree. We are grateful to Daily Express readers who are among more than 130,000 members of the public who have signed up to a NFU campaign, launched just 72 hours ago, imploring the government to reverse its decision to impose these new taxes on family farms.
I really don’t believe Treasury officials have thought this through. The £1m cap to APR and BPR won’t shield a lot of genuine food-producing farms with scale being the key to their viability as businesses – businesses that are the fabric of the iconic British countryside we cherish and the foundation of the British food we know consumers enjoy.
We estimate that at least half, probably more, UK family farm businesses, whether owner-occupied or tenanted, could be adversely affected. These farms are likely to be broken up as land is sold to meet the new, huge tax bill from HMRC.
The prospect of being unable to pass on the business to the next generation could be the final straw for many. Hard working farmers aren’t cash rich. They are not wealthy people. These are ordinary families who have spent decades building up their farm business to provide food for the nation, often on very tight profit margins, providing jobs in rural areas and delivering for the environment.
Later this month we will be mobilising our members for a mass lobby of MPs in Westminster. We will be asking farmers and growers from across the country to look their MP in the eye and tell them whether they support this.
Yesterday I met with Defra Secretary of State Steve Reed and officials from the Treasury. It’s important we continue to work with government to ensure they understand the situation, because I don’t believe the loss of family farms is something they want. There will be unintended consequences of the Budget and there is still time to change.
My message is clear. For the future of family farms across the country, as well as for the sake of Britain’s food security and our legislated environmental targets, there can only be one option. The only sensible course of action is for this family farm tax decision to be reversed.
Tom Bradshaw is President of the National Farmers Union
