SIGN UP HERE FOR YOUR DAILY BUSINESS BULLETIN<\/a>\n<\/p>\n\n The figure was later increased to \u00a32.5m after an outcry and widespread farmer protests over the measure.\n<\/p>\n
\n Mr Buckle has three children – Charlie, 32, Thomas, 25, and Emma, 23.\n<\/p>\n
\n “I didn’t think I could afford to wait for the next election,” he explained. “Hopefully my children will be able to carry on from where I get to.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Had he not acted he feared that the business would have been burdened with too big a tax bill, he said.\n<\/p>\n
\n “It’s ridiculous. We don’t know what anyone wants to do but we have had to make decisions earlier than we would have wanted to,” he added.\n<\/p>\n
\n “I think the current government are making it ridiculous.”\n<\/p>\n
\n He feels the chancellor doesn’t understand the nature of businesses like his.\n<\/p>\n
\n “It’s just incredible that a generational business like agriculture or any business – the longevity of that is generational – but she just doesn’t get it.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Mr Buckle said the business did have a turnover of \u00a385m but he has recently sold various businesses including an anaerobic digestion firm – sold two years ago – which has brought the figure down.\n<\/p>\n
\n Speaking at the annual meeting of the Suffolk branch of the Country Land and Business Association (CLA), he described how the business has grown.\n<\/p>\n
\n His father bought 120 acres at Semer in 1973. James’s business now owns about 5,000 acres. He has 1350ha of arable land, 416ha of grass and 256ha of woodland.\n<\/p>\n
\n About 10 years ago, he contracted out the livestock operation after a sheep farmer bought his stock.\n<\/p>\n
\n The arable company – Brett Vale Farming – is paid by Heathpatch to carry out the work.\n<\/p>\n
\n The landholding includes around 100ha at Raydon Wood where they are about to start producing charcoal .\n<\/p>\n
\n “Our real aim is to make our woodland really break even which would be a fantastic achievement,” he explained.\n<\/p>\n
\n The farm hosts an equestrian centre with around 60 horses.\n<\/p>\n
\n The estate has recently become home to about 1ha of turf containing precious wax cap mushrooms from a West Suffolk Hospital building project at Bury St Edmunds.\n<\/p>\n
\n This needed to be moved as part of a mitigation project related to the work – which involves building on ancient parkland, he explained.\n<\/p>\n
\n In total around 200 artic loads were transferred to his land.\n<\/p>\n
\n The business’s hospitality arm – Nedging Hall Estate Ltd – is run by James’ son, Charlie.\n<\/p>\n
\n This includes the Bildeston Crown, the Red Rose at Lindsey, and The Tap and Mauldons Brewery in Sudbury.\n<\/p>\n
\n Nedging Hall itself is rented out as a holiday home.\n<\/p>\n
\n The business recently acquired the Angel at Lavenham – a purchase he is “really excited about”, he said.\n<\/p>\n
\n Other businesses in the group include SMS Shredding, Cogent Technology, Global Machinery Solutions Ltd and Camden Boss Ltd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"James Buckle presides over a \u00a360 turnover multi-faceted business employing around 400 people called Heathpatch – which is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":463335,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[138,246,111,139,69,244,245],"class_list":["post-463334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-finance","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=463334"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463334\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/463335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=463334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=463334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=463334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}