Retailers side with farmers in opposition to Treasury IHT changes

The Countryside Alliance is pleased to see support for farmers continuing to grow, amidst the ongoing row over the Government’s Family Farm Tax.

Iceland’s Managing Director, Richard Walker, who is a public supporter of the Labour Party, became the latest supermarket boss to speak out against Rachel Reeves’ inheritance tax raid on the agricultural community, suggesting that the Chancellor go after online retailers instead of hard-working farmers.

The intervention came after criticism from the Countryside Alliance and campaign group ‘No Farmers, No Food’ who took to social media to question why the supermarket chain had maintained silence.

It is no longer just supermarkets in the spotlight, either. McDonald’s yesterday came out in support of farmers, though without fully criticising the Government.

Following pressure from farming and rural campaign groups, a spokesman for the company stated:

"We want to see policy that will support farmers and help them to grow their businesses.

“We recognise the importance of this issue to British farmers and are conscious of the concerns being raised.”

The Countryside Alliance hopes that McDonald’s, whose website states that British farmers are their 'most essential ingredient', will go further and join calls for Rachel Reeves to abandon her hated tax raid, rather than merely calling for support for farmers.

More than 50 signatories representing the food manufacturing industry, including Castell Howell, Dairy UK and Yeo Valley have also joined forces with National Farmers Union (NFU) to urge the Treasury to rethink its proposed changes to inheritance tax announced as part of the Autumn Budget.

Thirty town councils across the country have now openly rebelled against the Farm Tax in a campaign supported by the Countryside Alliance. The councils, from areas that represent millions of people across the United Kingdom, have in recent weeks passed motions calling on the Chancellor to axe the measure.

Commenting on these recent developments, Mo Metcalf-Fisher, Director of External Affairs at the Countryside Alliance, said:

“It is heartening to see support for farmers grow ever stronger, with both councils and major high street retailers calling on Rachel Reeves to abandon her hated Family Farm Tax.

“Rather than listening to common sense, to our farmers, to councils, to our supermarkets, the Chancellor still refuses to change course. The Government must realise that these plans are entirely unsustainable. This problem is not going away.”

Farmers are set to return to Westminster on February 10, after the Chancellor showed no sign of relenting on her harmful policy.

It will be the third major London protest since Ms Reeves’ Budget last year, in addition to dozens more up and down the country.