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TV presenter Kirstie Allsopp has accused the chancellor of ushering within the break-up of farms and estates by imposing a brand new 20 per cent inheritance tax on such belongings over £1m.
Farming and landowner organisations additionally warned the change, introduced in Wednesday’s Budget, would result in the “death of the family farm” as a result of house owners would promote up to pay the tax.
Rachel Reeves mentioned from April 2026, the primary £1m of mixed enterprise and agricultural belongings would proceed to draw no inheritance tax, however for belongings over that sum inheritance tax would apply.
Property skilled Ms Allsopp mentioned the choice threatened nice estates, writing on social media platform X: “Rachel Reeves had f****d all farmers, she has destroyed their ability to pass farms on to their children, and broken the future of all our great estates.
“It is an appalling decision which shows the government has zero understanding of what matters to rural voters.”
The transfer was condemned by the National Farmers’ Union, the Country Land and Business Association, and the Tenant Farmers Association, in line with Farmers Weekly.
DUP MP Carla Lockhart claimed farmers had been dealt a “potentially killer blow”.
Plaid Cymru MP Llinos Medi mentioned: “I am afraid that changes to rules on inheritance will seriously threaten Welsh family farms which are the backbone of the rural economy.”
One social media commentator known as Lynn mentioned: “If we have no farmers, we have no food… However, if you are happy for yet another industry to be taken over by big corporations that mass-produce poor-quality food from animals living in poor conditions or be dependent on imported food of equally poor quality, then yes let’s put all those small farms producing good quality and healthy food out of business.”
But one other mentioned the priority was overblown, as different nations had inheritance tax and nonetheless farmed.
David Walston wrote: “Predictably hysterical on here. £1m seems like a very low number, but no, this will not end farming in the UK. There are other countries that have inheritance tax, and they still farm.”
Meanwhile, conservationists are warning of a “monumental gap” between present funding and what is required to assist nature, because the Budget maintains farming spending at current ranges.
The authorities introduced £5bn for England’s farming price range over the following two years, sustaining the £2.4bn present stage for 2024-25 and 2025-26, and this 12 months additionally features a £200m underspend from earlier years.
Clarkson’s Farm presenter Jeremy Clarkson urged farmers to “hang on in there” in a submit on X.
He wrote: “Farmers. I know that you have been shafted today. But please don’t despair. Just look after yourselves for five short years and this shower will be gone.”
But Martin Lines, chief govt of the Nature Friendly Farming Network, mentioned the choice to take care of funding was higher information “than we could have hoped for in the lead-up to the Budget”.
“Increasing funding and prioritising nature-friendly farming will help put agriculture on a more sustainable footing and enable the changes required to continue feeding our nation as climate change presents ongoing challenges,” he mentioned.
The quantity going to environmental land administration schemes (Elms) will rise to a brand new excessive of £1.8bn, as the brand new programme replaces the outdated EU-era subsidies primarily based totally on the quantity of land farmed with funds for nature-friendly farming strategies and habitat creation.
There can also be £400m over two years for tree planting and peatland restoration to revive habitat and retailer carbon to sort out local weather change, which analysts mentioned was broadly according to funding for such schemes beneath the earlier authorities.
While Defra’s general funding will rise barely in actual phrases over this 12 months and subsequent, there’s a slight discount in its price range for day-to-day spending, and officers warned the farming and flood defences budgets confronted £600m of “funding pressures” – successfully unfunded spending commitments.
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