No further concessions on Inheritance Tax, says Defra

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reynolds defra secretary at ofc - Oxford Farming Conference

Source: Oxford Farming Conference

Despite protests by farmers disrupting traffic on Oxford High Street outside the Oxford Farming Conference, Emma Reynolds affirmed there would be no further movement on IHT

There will be no more concessions on the farming Inheritance Tax policy, environment secretary Emma Reynolds has confirmed.

Despite protests by farmers disrupting traffic on Oxford High Street outside the Oxford Farming Conference, Reynolds affirmed that there would be no further movement on IHT after changes were made to the policy.

Following significant backlash, the government announced at the end of last year that the level of the Agricultural & Business Property Relief threshold would increase from £1m to £2.5m when the policy comes into force in April. Through the latest changes, spouses or civil partners are allowed to pass on up to £5m in qualifying agricultural or business assets between them before paying Inheritance Tax, on top of existing allowances.

Protesters have called for more concessions or for the government to scrap the policy altogether but Reynolds said “that is it now”.

“The finance bill has its passage through Parliament next week and this is the change we are making,” she added. ”And, as I have said, the objective of the original policy stands.”

Former NFU president Baroness Minette Batters, who was speaking at the conference about her Farm Profitability review, said farmers would “need to move on” from the topic.

“If we keep going, in this one place, we are going to fail our farmers, and the government will walk away from us,” she explained.

“This is a really good result for the industry to get what we’ve got,” said Batters. ”It’s not everything, but it is a really good result – a lot of people will be able to sleep at night.”

Tom Bradshaw, current NFU president, echoed Batters’ points and confirmed the organisation would stop its ‘Stop the family farm tax’ campaign.

“I think we’re in that position where we’ve had that really hard, long-fought battle,” Bradshaw said. “We never wanted to be in a fight with the government about this but, in the end, that has been the only way to try and shift the dial.”

He added that the result was not perfect but that he believed the secretary of state when she said there would be no further movement on the policy.

“There’s a massive sense of relief for so many and that’s the overwhelming response that I have had from members up and down the country,” Bradshaw continued. “We will be looking at the next political opportunity to highlight that we do not believe IHT is correct – taxing business assets as though they were personal wealth we believe is fundamentally wrong.

“But, for this moment in time, the outcome we’ve got at the moment is the best we can achieve in the political environment.”

Paloma Shepherd-Grewar was one of the protesters who stood outside the conference and told The Grocer that she wanted the government to “listen to farmers, admit they have got this wrong, and revert to the original taxation relief method”.

“This is not the sensible reform Keir Starmer claims it is,” Shepherd-Grewar said. “Next time he tries to reform the rural sector, proper consultation needs to be the first step.”