Farmers backed by business chiefs over tractor tax anger

Sir Keir Starmer is under fresh pressure to reverse the family farm tax” as farmers and business chiefs today unite in London to call for the policy to be scrapped.

- ARCHIE MITCHELL

At the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) annual conference, the prime minister will be accused by the group’s president Tom Bradshaw of breaking a key promise to the industry “while new ministers had hardly found their way to their offices”.

And as the industry extends an olive branch to Sir Keir, urging him to work with farmers on his plans to grow the economy, Mr Bradshaw will once again call for the “morally wrong” policy to be axed.

Addressing more than 700 members, politicians and stakeholders at the conference, Mr Bradshaw will say: “There were only 87 words in Labour’s manifesto about farming, but some of those words gave us hope for the future: policies on imports, binding targets for British food for the public sector, a recognition that food security is national security.

“We recognise these are still early days for a new government, but new ministers had hardly found their way to their offices when they broke their first promise. And it’s one which overshadows all else, wiping out our ability to plan, to invest and, often, to hope. It hangs over our farms, our families, our futures: the family farm tax. This policy is morally wrong.”