Domestic Farming and Food Supply

Edward Morello Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2026 Westminster Hall

[Carla Lockhart]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Member’s assessment. I cannot be clearer: the family farm tax should be scrapped, and if Labour does not scrap it tomorrow, the party—and particularly its rural MPs—will not be forgiven at the ballot box. The land, sheds and machinery are needed to earn a living, and their value cannot simply be withdrawn from a bank account. If land has to be sold, the farm loses some of its ability to produce food and generate an income. For a business already operating on tight margins, that can make all the difference. It is not unreasonable for a farmer who has worked all their life to want their children to carry on that work. These are families who have gone without, borrowed, reinvested and spent years building something they hoped would outlast them.

More than a third of respondents to the UFU survey anticipated an inheritance tax bill of at least £100,000, and more than seven in 10 are less confident about passing on a financially viable business. Almost nine in 10 reported increased family stress or worry because of the changes. I ask the Minister to think about the conversations behind those figures—a father wondering what will happen when he is gone; a mother worried about the burden being left to her children; a young person who wants to farm but cannot see how the figures will stack up. There is enough worry in farming without the Government adding to it. Tomorrow, the Chancellor can lift some of that uncertainty, and I urge the Minister to make the case for restoring the historical reliefs and allowing working family farms to be passed on.

There are also decisions closer to home that are holding the industry back. In Northern Ireland, farmers are told to improve their buildings, reduce emissions and invest in better slurry management but when they try to do those things, they can find themselves caught in planning delays and environmental assessments with no clear way forward. In some cases, they cannot even get betterment through the planning system. A farmer may want to replace an old shed with a modern building, improve animal welfare and reduce emissions yet still struggle to secure approval. How does leaving the old building in place help anyone? I accept that applications must be properly assessed, but there must be a workable route for proposals that demonstrably improve the existing position.

Farmers are spending money on advice, reports and revised applications while the costs of proposed work continue to rise. Ministers at Stormont need to get to grips with this. Farmers cannot be expected to modernise if the system prevents them from doing so. The situation is exactly the same here in GB, and farmers are fed up with being made the fall guy in the pursuit of net zero. They are expected to produce affordable food, look after the countryside and pay for the changes demanded of them, often without any realistic explanation of how their business is supposed to bear the cost. Some of those making the demands would do well to spend a week on a working farm.

[Edward Morello (West Dorset) (LD)]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech and raises many points that go far beyond Northern Ireland. She is talking about the need to improve farms and combat climate change, but how are farmers supposed to engage seriously in this process? My farmers in West Dorset are unable to apply for the sustainable farming incentive because the window is closing so quickly and it is not properly funded. That is leaving them drastically under-budget for the financial year ahead and wondering why they are continuing to meet all the demands being made by the Government when they are not getting a fair settlement.

[Carla Lockhart]

The hon. Member’s farmers will have heard his point very clearly. He is a real advocate for the farming community in his constituency, and he is absolutely right. Driving production overseas will not remove the need for food. It will leave us buying more of it from elsewhere, with less control over how it is produced and with further distances to transport it.