The England lionesses* are "role modeling silence". Rather than just not commenting on something.
What. A. Fucking. World.
* Made up name.
5 May 2023
573
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Yesterday morning my daughter's school announced they were going to celebrate national wellies day today, in support of our local farming community. Somehow they "missed" the potential political element of this on the day farmers drive their tractors to that there London town.
Early evening yesterday, the school "cancelled" the wellies fiesta as it had been brought to the school's attention that it might be viewed as a political protest. Cancellation was by a message on the new school app that doesn't seem to work. Seems the farmers "didn't" get the message and have all turned up in wellies, messages of panic coming through now, students in isolation, parents must bring in shoes and collect wellies. "But it's snowing".
I worked there last year. The Deputy Head who sent out the first message yesterday is a very intelligent daughter of one of the largest farms in the area. The rest of the leadership are dozy as fuck and probably genuinely had no idea of the potential political protest they were walking into.
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The whole farming protest thing is a mess. The Govt certainly got the comms wrong, as they have on a few occasions recently. And it looks to me like either the Govt, HMRC and the OBR have badly miscalculated the sums or they seriously underestimated the way that "Who want to be a millionaire tax dodger?" Jeremy Clarkson and his landowning mates could galvanise the right wing press and others into trying to defend their little loophole. It seems that Tommy Robinson and others on the far right are joining in the protests now too. What could possibly go wrong?
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Farmers always protest against a Labour government. Was the same with fuel duty back in the early noughties.
Party political driven nonsense.
Personally think they can go fuck themselves.
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Barely even giving it my time to read about it. Fuck em.
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If you want all farms to be owned by conglomerates then this is a good policy.
If you want small farms, this is an abject policy that will lead to a massive proportion of those farms being sold.
The issue is (as with Business property relief) that you are taxing an asset that isn't very liquid.
With a business it should be producing profits to pay the tax over 10 years, for a farm not so much. These farms are often barely making any profit at all.
I think the concept is valid but the implementation has been abject - not just in Comms - but in the levels set - if it was a £2.5m per person (so £5m for a husband and wife) it would be far more justifiable.
It isn't as if people are getting away with paying no tax - if they keep farming they have a theoretical asset which produces little income - if they sell it they pay Capital Gains tax.
Ironically, setting it at the £1m allowance is really helping rich hobby farmers - I'm sure that wasn't the intention.
I don't think anyone disagrees that the large landowners should be charged
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Apart from the likes of Nigel Farage, Tommy Robinson, Jeremey Clarkson, and the large financial organisations and individuals who have bought farm land specifically to avoid inheritance tax?
Inheritance tax planning is a thing. I would have thought you would have known that as an accountant? If farms are being farmed, they can be passed as businesses with business relief and the land in trust. Also insurance against inheritance tax liability is relatively cheap if a principal owner is of working age (ie actively able to farm), and inheritance tax planning can form around business succession planning.
If the farm is really a personal asset, handed down to a member of the family, what is the rationale for making it inheritance tax free? That is surely beneficial to relatively large asset holders, at the cost of ordinary members of society?
Less than 50% of recently sold farm land has actually gone to farmers, more than 50% has been purchased by wealthy individuals as part of inheritance tax planning. Those and foreign investors ( Russians, petrochemical state wealth).*
I say this, as someone who hopes to be actually farming this time next year.
* As a consequence the farming returns on land have declined (brexshit, problems picking, transporting, and selling produce, with reduction in subsidy, and removal of many farming grants, and the reducing cost paid by a small group of highly influential buyers - supermarkets, who are able to apply unfair competition from inferior standard food in the global supply chain - ie shit american meat) as the price of land has gone up - not because it is being farmed, but because it is of inherent value, and (until now) essentially unburdened by taxation on disposal/inheritance. If we really want farming to be done here, it needs to be accompanied with removing the artificially high investment cost of land, and increase the returns on actual farming.
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Tell us more on you becoming a farmer (apologies if I've missed the details previously)!?
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I hear, from those who have seen Clarksons farm, that it's great fun driving around the countryside in a tractor, being a prick. Who wouldn't be seduced by the romance of that lifestyle?
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....this protest (no new laws enacted to criminalise it, no sign of the met wading in truncheoning first and asking questions later, no mainstream media journalists being arrested for 'participating in the protest') is brilliant satire.
"Those of you who are in a fog of despair for what has been foisted upon you" whines the snowflake on the stage, seemingly much more concerned about building societies capital at the cost of fair taxation, than they were at the prospect of millions of children in child poverty going hungry. These things are not, and should not, be in competition with each other...but this lot can get fucked. If it means land prices fall, and more actually get farmed (and I don't mean occasionally producing a crop of houses, so that the owner can buy a new jet), then all good.
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I’m also a bit confused. The Tories think it is ok to protest now?
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Only about preserving inherited wealth. Not about them trashing the planet for profit, and shitting in your water. Keep up.
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The Turdpuddle martyrs?
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There's some religious headcase saying some bonkers stuff on my radio. You know, the sort of thing with no factual basis, but heavy on belief and "pointing to Jesus and what he does in your life". Without any comment whatsoever. On the same sort of radio station where if you suggest that the russians might be interfering in the wests democratic processes, they call you a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy nutter.
funny world.
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Can you remind me of the tax charges on trusts and the costs of running trusts for a small family farm making very little money?
Undoubtedly trusts will be the answers for some - but trusts aren't tax free - there are professional fees and decennial charges - you pay tax, it is just more predictable.
I am not against IHT on farm land, as you would have seen if you read what you quoted, I just think the level it has been set at is wrong. It should either be at double the value (at least) or set at a set number of acres - to remove the need for inflationary increases.
Of course these new rules will be good for me - we have a lot of farmers for clients - but not good for the sector.
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It will be good for the farming sector, if it returns more affordable land to actual farming. It will be bad for the tax free inheritance sector. Swings and roundabouts, as with any tax change. What is clear is that what we are currently doing, doesn't work for any sector. Except for the inherited wealth and privilege sector.
