The president of the National Farmers’ Union was embroiled in a fiery clash with LBC presenter Matthew Wright over planned inheritance tax changes due to be brought in by Labour.
Sir Keir Starmer has defended the changes to IHT rules as protesters prepare to descend on Westminster on Tuesday (18/11).
Speaking to reporters on his way to the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, the prime minister said he was “absolutely confident” that the overwhelming majority of farmers would be exempt from the changes, suggesting this message may not be getting through.
“For a typical case, which is parents with a farm they want to pass on to one of their children, by the time you’ve taken into account not only the exemption for the farm property itself, but also the exemption for spouse to spouse, then parent to child, it’s £3 million before any inheritance tax will be payable.
“That’s why I am absolutely confident the vast majority of farms and farmers will not be affected by this. It’s important for us to keep communicating how that works. Over the £3 million, it’s then 20 per cent rather than the usual rate and it’s payable over 10 years.”
But Tom Bradshaw, the NFU’s president, has announced that his members felt “betrayed” by the moves.
Speaking to Sky News, he said that he had “never seen the united sense of anger that there is in this industry today” and that he expected thousands of farmers to be at the protests.
He also went toe-to-toe with Matthew Wright on LBC, who suggested farmers should “suck it up”.
Watch the clash below:
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