What do Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves not understand about APR (agricultural property relief)? The simple purpose for APR was to help farms stay in families so that they can continue to produce food and care for the countryside.
Following the so far failed attempts by the NFU and CLA to ‘reason’ with the government, it looks as though working farmers are planning to take things into their own hands, with further protests across the country. An ‘underground’ movement is taking shape which will spread as the anger grows, and who can blame those who see their life’s work, their futures and the legacies left by our forefathers destroyed at the whim of this ignorant, left-wing destructive Labour government.
The contents of the Budget were debated last week in Parliament and sure enough passed with a thumping majority including the matter of 20 per cent IHT on farms. Rural Labour MPs, some representing farmers in their constituencies, face a furious backslash as they opposed the conservative motion for this so called ‘family farm tax’, to be axed.
I wonder if Starmer and Reeves will attend any of the funerals of the elderly who die from hypothermia or hunger during the cold winter months. Will they venture into the countryside to attend services ‘celebrating’ the lives of dedicated elderly working farmers who will unexpectedly perish following on farm fatal accidents as March 2026 looms, as has been predicted.
In a final act of defiance, desperate farmers who know they will not survive the required seven years to avoid their successors having to pay 20 per cent inheritance tax on the value of their farm’s worth more than £1 million, (most are). Shame on these spiteful Labour politicians sitting in their gilded London cages in their designer clothes paid for by the PMs mate Lord Ali.
Perhaps it is time for politicians to experience life on a proper working family farm. Get up at 4am to milk cows, go out in all weathers checking livestock and mending fences brought down by local vandals or the extreme weather. Take livestock to markets or abattoirs; for some farmers this can be a round trip of two to three hours or more.
Worry about harvesting crops as they watch the rain lashing down in the summer and look at the books which show very little financial returns if any, after removing the cost of production, fixed costs, insurance, fuel, fertiliser, labour, NI and Tax.
Perhaps then weigh that all up and then explain how any farmer can be expected to pay Inheritance Tax of 20 per cent of the value of the farm, farmhouse, farm buildings, live and dead stock, machinery, and land.
Does the successor sell the farmhouse and buy a caravan? Do they sell land to developers or city traders escaping to the country. What will happen over the decades ahead as gradually more and more productive land disappears under tarmac and concrete, wind turbines, solar panels, or is rewilded or just abandoned? Who will provide the food to fill the supermarket shelves then?
There is also the worry within the industry over the impact of future trade deals, substandard food imports and the recent sudden removal of farming grants. Is it any wonder that it is not only the countryside which is rising up and considering ways to make this calamitous government listen. Five more years of their self-destruct policies which are already crippling industry, small businesses, the environment and discouraging innovation and investment.
Tom Harris retells the comedian Bill Bailey’s view of how Ed Miliband’s role as leader of the Labour Party came about by comparing him to a plastic bag stuck in a tree: no one knows how it got there, and nobody can be bothered bringing it down. He believes the Prime Minister is sending out similar ‘plastic bag’ vibes as his predecessor and predicts that Starmer’s lack of personality and common sense will not get him to the end of this parliament. Time will tell.
Whilst mentioning Ed Miliband, when is he going to give the green light to the SMR (Small Modular Reactor) industry? What is he waiting for as Rolls Royce SMR, EDF, GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy, Westinghouse Electric Company, NuScale Power and Holtec Britain have been ready to move forward since last year to enable the UK to lead the global race to develop cutting-edge technologies to rapidly deliver cleaner, cheaper energy and greater energy security. The previous government were poised to award contracts, but Miliband seems wedded to covering thousands of square miles of farmland with questionable solar panels and wind turbines, all of which have a short life span and the carbon cost for manufacturing, importing and then decommission them is eye watering.
The Conservative government’s plan was for up to a quarter of all UK electricity to come from nuclear power by 2050 and to deliver operational SMRs by the mid-2030s. Have I missed something, have any of these companies been awarded contracts, does Miliband really have a plan?
Following the so far failed attempts by the NFU and CLA to ‘reason’ with the government, it looks as though working farmers are planning to take things into their own hands, with further protests across the country. An ‘underground’ movement is taking shape which will spread as the anger grows, and who can blame those who see their life’s work, their futures and the legacies left by our forefathers destroyed at the whim of this ignorant, left-wing destructive Labour government.
The contents of the Budget were debated last week in Parliament and sure enough passed with a thumping majority including the matter of 20 per cent IHT on farms. Rural Labour MPs, some representing farmers in their constituencies, face a furious backslash as they opposed the conservative motion for this so called ‘family farm tax’, to be axed.
I wonder if Starmer and Reeves will attend any of the funerals of the elderly who die from hypothermia or hunger during the cold winter months. Will they venture into the countryside to attend services ‘celebrating’ the lives of dedicated elderly working farmers who will unexpectedly perish following on farm fatal accidents as March 2026 looms, as has been predicted.
In a final act of defiance, desperate farmers who know they will not survive the required seven years to avoid their successors having to pay 20 per cent inheritance tax on the value of their farm’s worth more than £1 million, (most are). Shame on these spiteful Labour politicians sitting in their gilded London cages in their designer clothes paid for by the PMs mate Lord Ali.
Perhaps it is time for politicians to experience life on a proper working family farm. Get up at 4am to milk cows, go out in all weathers checking livestock and mending fences brought down by local vandals or the extreme weather. Take livestock to markets or abattoirs; for some farmers this can be a round trip of two to three hours or more.
Worry about harvesting crops as they watch the rain lashing down in the summer and look at the books which show very little financial returns if any, after removing the cost of production, fixed costs, insurance, fuel, fertiliser, labour, NI and Tax.
Perhaps then weigh that all up and then explain how any farmer can be expected to pay Inheritance Tax of 20 per cent of the value of the farm, farmhouse, farm buildings, live and dead stock, machinery, and land.
Does the successor sell the farmhouse and buy a caravan? Do they sell land to developers or city traders escaping to the country. What will happen over the decades ahead as gradually more and more productive land disappears under tarmac and concrete, wind turbines, solar panels, or is rewilded or just abandoned? Who will provide the food to fill the supermarket shelves then?
There is also the worry within the industry over the impact of future trade deals, substandard food imports and the recent sudden removal of farming grants. Is it any wonder that it is not only the countryside which is rising up and considering ways to make this calamitous government listen. Five more years of their self-destruct policies which are already crippling industry, small businesses, the environment and discouraging innovation and investment.
Tom Harris retells the comedian Bill Bailey’s view of how Ed Miliband’s role as leader of the Labour Party came about by comparing him to a plastic bag stuck in a tree: no one knows how it got there, and nobody can be bothered bringing it down. He believes the Prime Minister is sending out similar ‘plastic bag’ vibes as his predecessor and predicts that Starmer’s lack of personality and common sense will not get him to the end of this parliament. Time will tell.
Whilst mentioning Ed Miliband, when is he going to give the green light to the SMR (Small Modular Reactor) industry? What is he waiting for as Rolls Royce SMR, EDF, GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy, Westinghouse Electric Company, NuScale Power and Holtec Britain have been ready to move forward since last year to enable the UK to lead the global race to develop cutting-edge technologies to rapidly deliver cleaner, cheaper energy and greater energy security. The previous government were poised to award contracts, but Miliband seems wedded to covering thousands of square miles of farmland with questionable solar panels and wind turbines, all of which have a short life span and the carbon cost for manufacturing, importing and then decommission them is eye watering.
The Conservative government’s plan was for up to a quarter of all UK electricity to come from nuclear power by 2050 and to deliver operational SMRs by the mid-2030s. Have I missed something, have any of these companies been awarded contracts, does Miliband really have a plan?
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