{"id":208983,"date":"2025-12-29T04:21:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T04:21:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/208983\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T04:21:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T04:21:17","slug":"labour-backs-down-over-farmers-inheritance-tax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/208983\/","title":{"rendered":"Labour Backs Down Over Farmers’ Inheritance Tax"},"content":{"rendered":"

The government<\/a> has U-turned on its plans to launch an inheritance tax raid on farmers.<\/p>\n

After months of intense backlash and protests in Westminster, Labour has increased the threshold \u2013 the point at which inhertance tax would apply on large farm estates \u2013 from land worth \u00a31 million to those worth \u00a32.5 million when it is introduced in April.<\/p>\n

The new plan will also permit spouses to pass on \u00a35 million of assets between them before they have to pay the inheritance tax.<\/p>\n

This means the total number of estates impacted will drop from 375 to 185 \u2013 and the U-turn could cost around \u00a3130 million.<\/p>\n

It comes after prime minister Keir Starmer<\/a> told a Commons committee hearing<\/a> last week that he had been told of farmers with terminal illnesses who were planning to kill themselves before the new rules came in to avoid the tax.<\/p>\n

Environment secretary Emma Reynolds claimed the government\u2019s change of heart came about after listening to those within the agriculture community.<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cFarmers are at the heart of our food security and environmental stewardship, and I am determined to work with them to secure a profitable future for British farming.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have listened closely to farmers across the country and we are making changes today to protect more ordinary family farms. We are increasing the individual threshold from \u00a31m to \u00a32.5m which means couples with estates of up to 5m will now pay no inheritance tax on their estates.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s only right that larger estates contribute more, while we back the farms and trading businesses that are the backbone of Britain\u2019s rural communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the new U-turn has caused frustration from those within Labour, too.<\/p>\n

One MP told HuffPost UK: \u201cAnother hill we\u2019ve been forced to climb only to be marched back down again. This government is like being stuck in a room with \u2018The Thick of It\u2019 on repeat.\u201d<\/p>\n

A rural Labour MP said the government had been \u201cdragged along to do the bare minimum\u201d.<\/p>\n

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch described the U-turn as a \u201cbig win for the Conservative Party\u2019s campaign against Labour\u2019s Family Farm Tax.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added: \u201cThis fight isn\u2019t finished. Other family businesses are still affected by Labour\u2019s tax raid, and we will keep pushing until the tax is lifted from them too. But today is an important win, and proof that standing up for what\u2019s fair, even when the odds are against us can make a real difference.\u201d <\/p>\n

Reform\u2019s deputy leader Richard Tice also pounced on the government\u2019s flip-flopping.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cLabour\u2019s tax raid on family farms has already been a disaster for the sector, plunging countless farmers into despair, with heartbreaking reports of some taking their own lives in order to save their farms for future generations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis cynical climbdown \u2013 whilst better than nothing \u2013 does little to address the year of anxiety that farmers have faced in planning to protect their livelihoods. Even with the raised threshold, many family farms will still face crippling bills. With British agriculture hanging by a thread, the government must go further and abolish this callous farms tax.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Lib Dems\u2019 rural affairs spokesperson, Tim Farron, said: \u201cIt is utterly inexcusable that family farmers have been put through over a year of uncertainty and anguish since the government first announced these changes.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiberal Democrats were the first to call out and oppose the unfair family farm tax in last years Budget and we have been proud to stand alongside our farming communities to campaign against it ever since. This concession has been hard won, and I am so grateful to all the farmers who have fought tirelessly to achieve this.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is about justice and security \u2013 if we undermine British farming then we also undermine our ability to provide us with the food we need to keep us secure in an uncertain world.<\/p>\n

\u201cYet many family farms will still find themselves financially crippled and barely making the minimum wage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe demand that the government scraps this unfair tax in full and if they refuse to, Liberal Democrats will submit amendments in the new year to bring it down.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The government has U-turned on its plans to launch an inheritance tax raid on farmers. After months of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208984,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[114,7186,268,85,46,11730,266,267],"class_list":{"0":"post-208983","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-farmers","10":"tag-finance","11":"tag-il","12":"tag-israel","13":"tag-labour-party","14":"tag-personal-finance","15":"tag-personalfinance"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208983"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208983\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}