Plight of Farmers.

[Nutmegyeti]

I trained doing farm accounts 25 years ago, it’s an incredibly short sighted move by this Government.

Working farms should be exempt. All this will do is create more rich land owners, and kill off working farms.

I can quite believe Starmer worked on a farm though, he’s managed to combine bull**** and horse**** in just a few months.

 

[Wisbech Eagle]

What I don’t understand is why all the farmers I have seen interviewed, who have stated how bad this is, didn’t just read the HOL and then they would realise it is all fine.

They certainly need to seek better advice than they have been receiving. Something the NFU seem to have a lot to answer for.

Good asset management and tax planning should see all but the mega rich land banking tax avoiders completely avoiding any impact from this.

It could force the price of land down as it gets sold to pay the tax thus opening up opportunities, not diminishing them.

 

[Mapletree]

I trained doing farm accounts 25 years ago, it’s an incredibly short sighted move by this Government.

Working farms should be exempt. All this will do is create more rich land owners, and kill off working farms.

I can quite believe Starmer worked on a farm though, he’s managed to combine bull**** and horse**** in just a few months.

Why?

Perhaps you would like to put the LSE straight. Paul Cheshire is a CBE and winner of The Royal Economic Society’s Best Paper Prize. I am sure he will be fascinated by your insights.

 

[Nutmegyeti]

They certainly need to seek better advice than they have been receiving. Something the NFU seem to have a lot to answer for.

Good asset management and tax planning should see all but the mega rich land banking tax avoiders completely avoiding any impact from this.

It could force the price of land down as it gets sold to pay the tax thus opening up opportunities, not diminishing them.

It’s really not that simple. I work in tax planning every day and have done for the last 25+ years. You can’t wave a magic wand and just make it disappear.

It’s about liquid assets - doesn’t matter what an asset is worth if you can’t afford the cash.

And it’s also about encouraging the next generation. As if you don’t have anyone coming through then there is no one to take it on.

 

[Mapletree]

It’s really not that simple. I work in tax planning every day and have done for the last 25+ years. You can’t wave a magic wand and just make it disappear.

It’s about liquid assets - doesn’t matter what an asset is worth if you can’t afford the cash.

And it’s also about encouraging the next generation. As if you don’t have anyone coming through then there is no one to take it on.

Is it hard to give the assets to your children before you die? That likely would encourage them.

 

[Wisbech Eagle]

I trained doing farm accounts 25 years ago, it’s an incredibly short sighted move by this Government.

Working farms should be exempt. All this will do is create more rich land owners, and kill off working farms.

I can quite believe Starmer worked on a farm though, he’s managed to combine bull**** and horse**** in just a few months.

They almost all will be.

It’s the mega rich using the current system to buy up large quantities of land to avoid IT who are the target.

 

[Mapletree]

Is it hard to give the assets to your children before you die? That likely would encourage them. And just to repeat, very few farms are worth more than £3m and still family owned. Farms with multiple owners get an extra million relief for each owner.

 

[Living In Hope]

Coming late to this topic and I haven't read all previous comments. All I can say is that I have a couple of good friends who are farmers, and they appear wealthy in terms of assets, but their income is really limited. The good thing they have is the ability to pass their business from generation to generation, and it's a business which is of critical importance to the country. My view is that there is simply not enough profit in it to attract anyone else in if you can't pass it from one generation to the next, so it seems to me a very unwise policy which is not only unfair but will be detrimental to the country's ability to feed itself. I do stand to be corrected as I haven't looked at the nuances of the policy, but if it was really only going to capture people who buy a farm as a tax-avoidance measure (whiff of bullshit in my view), I doubt there would be large numbers of farmers converging on London to protest.

 

[Nutmegyeti]

Why?

Perhaps you would like to put the LSE straight. Paul Cheshire is a CBE and winner of The Royal Economic Society’s Best Paper Prize. I am sure he will be fascinated by your insights.

No you’re absolutely right, why should I have an opinion based on a subject I’ve personally been involved in.

That’s the thing with theoretical, you can be an expert without ever having seen the trenches.

 

[Teddy Eagle]

No you’re absolutely right, why should I have an opinion based on a subject I’ve personally been involved in.

That’s the thing with theoretical, you can be an expert without ever having seen the trenches.

Welcome to HOL.

 

[Mapletree]

Coming late to this topic and I haven't read all previous comments. All I can say is that I have a couple of good friends who are farmers, and they appear wealthy in terms of assets, but their income is really limited. The good thing they have is the ability to pass their business from generation to generation, and it's a business which is of critical importance to the country. My view is that there is simply not enough profit in it to attract anyone else in if you can't pass it from one generation to the next, so it seems to me a very unwise policy which is not only unfair but will be detrimental to the country's ability to feed itself. I do stand to be corrected as I haven't looked at the nuances of the policy, but if it was really only going to capture people who buy a farm as a tax-avoidance measure (whiff of bullshit in my view), I doubt there would be large numbers of farmers converging on London to protest.

20,000 people studying agriculture yet you doubt there is demand? Land prices have overheated due to the IHT advantage. As a result ROCE is very poor. This measure should never have been introduced by the Thatcher government and is preventing keen young people from gaining a foothold.

 

[Wisbech Eagle]

It’s really not that simple. I work in tax planning every day and have done for the last 25+ years. You can’t wave a magic wand and just make it disappear.

It’s about liquid assets - doesn’t matter what an asset is worth if you can’t afford the cash.

And it’s also about encouraging the next generation. As if you don’t have anyone coming through then there is no one to take it on.

If you have family who will continue the business then you need to give enough of it to them early enough to avoid the tax. In most cases that will still be nil, but for a few it could be.

If you don’t have family to continue then just like everyone whoever inherits pays the appropriate IT when the business gets sold.

 

[Nutmegyeti]

If you have family who will continue the business then you need to give enough of it to them early enough to avoid the tax. In most cases that will still be nil, but for a few it could be.

If you don’t have family to continue then just like everyone whoever inherits pays the appropriate IT when the business gets sold.

Ok do that. Then try borrowing against it for a new combine or tractor.

 

[georgenorman]

It's just part of the usual Socialist, tax everyone and everything and then p it up the wall, approach.

 

[Mapletree]

No you’re absolutely right, why should I have an opinion based on a subject I’ve personally been involved in.

That’s the thing with theoretical, you can be an expert without ever having seen the trenches.

I asked you to explain, can you do so or is this opinion simply intuition. And what makes you think I haven’t been in the trenches?

I have explained my viewpoint with facts and statistics, plus commentary from a top specialist in the appropriate field. Perhaps you could do likewise.

 

[Rudi Hedman]

Coming late to this topic and I haven't read all previous comments. All I can say is that I have a couple of good friends who are farmers, and they appear wealthy in terms of assets, but their income is really limited. The good thing they have is the ability to pass their business from generation to generation, and it's a business which is of critical importance to the country. My view is that there is simply not enough profit in it to attract anyone else in if you can't pass it from one generation to the next, so it seems to me a very unwise policy which is not only unfair but will be detrimental to the country's ability to feed itself. I do stand to be corrected as I haven't looked at the nuances of the policy, but if it was really only going to capture people who buy a farm as a tax-avoidance measure (whiff of bullshit in my view), I doubt there would be large numbers of farmers converging on London to protest.

If the government wanted a tax policy to target land buying tax avoidance then create one. And aren’t there still family farms worth £6mil that again don’t make much and may decide to sell up to the highest bidder? (Often property developers)

 

[Rudi Hedman]

Welcome to HOL.

Nutmegyeti is a great name.

 

[georgenorman]

The crypto-communists see farmers as legitimate targets as they are predominantly white, hard-working and tend to be conservative with a small 'c' and traditionalists - all things that they hate.

 

[Mapletree]

If the government wanted a tax policy to target land buying tax avoidance then create one. And aren’t there still family farms worth £6mil that again don’t make much and may decide to sell up to the highest bidder? (Often property developers)

In the uk it isn’t easy to get planning permission on agricultural land. In Ireland it was too easy and created a massive problem after the financial crash which I spent years working on with ‘bad banks’.

As above, if there is money in selling to developers the larger land owners won’t be shy. But generally planning laws and farm locations don’t support such sales.

It has been stated as impossible to get data on profit by farm value. That’s a shame. But we do know that the larger farms relatively are much more profitable than smaller farms.

IHT relief for farms was a wrongly conceived policy from the outset, introduced as a populist measure. Why try to put on a sticking plaster and leave the wound festering beneath.

 

[Mapletree]

The crypto-communists see farmers as legitimate targets as they are predominantly white, hard-working and tend to be conservative with a small 'c' and traditionalists - all things that they hate.

If I am one of your targets you presumably have forgotten that I have always been clear my daughter is a farmer. Another of my children is a chartered accountant working on farming clients.