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Hundreds of tractors drove through Parliament Square on Wednesday in the latest protest by UK farmers against changes to tax reliefs announced by Rachel Reeves in the Budget.
Farmers from across the country drove to central London to join the rally under the banner “RIP British Farming”, the most recent in a string of demonstrations by the industry, which says it is buckling under the strains of climate change, withdrawal of subsidies and post-Brexit trade deals.
The protest took place as MPs on the House of Commons environment, food and rural affairs committee heard evidence from tax experts and farming group leaders about the impact of the proposed changes to inheritance tax reliefs on the farming and wider rural community.
Under reforms to agricultural property and business property relief set out by the chancellor, farmers will be liable to pay a tax rate of 20 per cent on inherited agricultural and business assets valued at more than £1mn, which were previously exempt. The changes will apply from April 2026.
Farming leaders told MPs that the government had not listened to their concerns and warned that many farmers were considering dying by suicide before the changes took effect in 2026, rather than risk saddling their children with an unmanageable tax bill in the event of their death.
“Those people who are in ill health or who don’t believe they will be able to live for the seven years may well decide they shouldn’t be here in April 2026,” Tom Bradshaw, president of the National Farmers Union, told the committee. “No policy should ever be published that has that unintended side effect.”
According to inheritance tax rules, farmers can gift agricultural assets while they are alive, but their estate remains liable for the duties if they die within seven years of the gift.
After the hearing, Bradshaw told the Financial Times that the NFU was seeking a full consultation on the impact of the changes alongside other farm groups, and that ministers had failed to clarify what the targets were meant to achieve.
“We’ve tried to give the government some space but they haven’t moved so far, so we understand why farmers are feeling they need to make sure their voices are heard,” he said.
As tractors parked along Whitehall blasted their horns, Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey urged Sir Keir Starmer at prime minister’s questions later on Wednesday to “change course” on the policy.
Starmer defended the reforms, saying that for a typical farming family the threshold was closer to £3mn than £1mn, and accused the Conservatives of “fear-mongering”.
Opposition MPs including Nigel Farage and James Cleverly posed for photographs with farmers at Wednesday’s protest.
James Tassel, a sheep and cattle farmer from East Sussex at the protest with his wife and child, said the inheritance tax changes were one in a long list of problems facing farmers.
“We’ve all worked hours and hours to earn nothing. And then they import lower grade food made at cheaper cost and we have to try and compete — it’s not a level playing field,” he said.
Save British Farming, the group that organised the protest on Wednesday, and arranged a similar rally in March this year, has called for the IHT changes to be scrapped. It also wants the government to seek a veterinary agreement with the EU — a deal that Labour has said it will seek — and to reverse the accelerated removal of EU-era farming subsidies.
Farmers have not received payments under the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy since Brexit. Instead the UK has transitioned to a new scheme that rewards farmers for improving the natural environment and biodiversity, as well as reducing emissions.