Responding to news the inheritance tax threshold will be raised to £2.5m, after a long-fought campaign by the Union, NFU Cymru President Aled Jones said: “Over the past 14 months NFU Cymru, and its members, have been tireless in their efforts to amend the proposals, culminating in the ‘NO IHT’ mosaic display at the Winter Fair on the eve of this year’s budget.
“Today’s announcement, which sees the tax threshold raised from £1m to £2.5m, is a major development which will take many Welsh family farms above the threshold for Inheritance tax and will greatly reduce the tax burden for others. The change announced today, alongside the announcement by the Chancellor in last month’s budget to allow spousal transfer will mean that for many up to £5m in qualifying agricultural or business assets will be able to be passed on to the next generation before paying inheritance tax.
“When it became clear that we weren’t going to get rid of the proposals announced in the October 2024 budget NFU Cymru, alongside our colleagues in the NFU, NFU Scotland and Ulster Farmers Union, have left no stone unturned in lobbying for changes that would mitigate the worst elements of the original proposals. Today’s announcement alongside the changes in the November budget will be very welcome news to many Welsh family farms, coming as it does just before Christmas, a time when families come together.”
“I’d like to thank all our NFU Cymru members for their diligent and consistent lobbying of MPs, often having to share tragic and upsetting deeply personal stories with politicians and the media. I would like to thank the supply chain who stood by us throughout, recognising the damage that the original proposals would have caused not just to family farms but to rural Wales. The public have also been fantastic, with so many of them making up the 270,000 signatures I delivered to No 10 as part of the Stop the Family Farm Tax Petition earlier this year.
“We must also recognise the Welsh Labour MPs who were willing to meet with us and hear first-hand the human impact the original proposals would have had on farming families, who have stood up for their constituents and backed Welsh farming and rural Wales, and who in recent weeks demonstrated their support for our campaign by abstaining from the Budget Resolution 50. We owe our gratitude to them for helping the UK Government make the changes needed.”
“Our thanks go to both the Westminster Welsh Affairs Committee and the EFRA Committee for their reports and recommendations on this matter and also the support of all the opposition parties.”
“As a Union we have met with the Prime Minister, the DEFRA Secretary of State and the Welsh Office. I’d like to thank the UK Government for recognising that the original proposals would have caused untold damage to Welsh and British farming and for making the changes they have, which are very much welcomed and will make a significant difference to family farms the length and breadth of the Country.”