Sporting a T-shirt emblazoned with the words “Keir Starmer the family farmer harmer,” Archie Godman, who will one day inherit his family farm in West Sussex, said the prime minister’s policy was “not sustainable.”
“The tax that we would have to pay on our farm would be in the millions — even after the allowances. Most farms make half a percent to one percent of their total value each year,” he said. “If you’re lucky it’s a profit — but some years it won’t be. Like today we’re at the whims of the weather. It’s a tough job but this has made it impossible.”
Matthew Cooper, a fifth-generation farmer from Essex carrying a sign saying: “Buggered by Boris” and “Rogered by Reeves”, said the inheritance tax changes posed an “existential threat to many family farms like ours and something that we just wouldn’t be able to pay. It would mean selling off a portion of our farm which we would be very loathe to do.”
Jo Hilditch, a farmer from North-West Herefordshire who has appeared on episodes of TV hits the Hairy Bikers and Countryfile and is famed for her cassis liqueur, said her kids would face a tax bill of “at least half a million” if she passed down the business to them, leaving them with no choice but to sell the farm.
“We’re being shafted,” she said, pointing to a doctored sign featuring a smiling Chancellor Rachel Reeves next to the words “I’m backing shafting British farming.”
No backing down
Until now farmers have had to pay zero inheritance tax, but from April 2026 they will need to stump up 20 percent on assets above £1 million that are passed on. That’s still less than the standard 40 percent for others who contribute inheritance tax.
Ministers argue that, subject to individual circumstances, agricultural assets worth as much as £3 million will still be able to be passed on tax-free, once remaining reliefs are taken into account.
The changes, the government said, are necessary to plug the “£22 billion fiscal hole” they inherited from the previous Conservative government and close a loophole exploited by some of the wealthiest estates.
