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Telegraph

The disastrous implications of the Government's squeeze on farmers

SIR – Annabel Denham ('Labour's onslaught could kill off Britain's family farms and our island's food security with it', Comment, August 16) mentions that the civil servant whose 'analysis' underpinned the planned changes to inheritance tax for farms was named as HMRC's internal 'Expert of the Year'. At a stroke, he and the Chancellor are burdening people who will have no option but to sell assets in order to pay the tax. These are the very assets they earn a living from, agricultural land. Had this 'expert' not heard the saying about killing the goose that lays the golden egg? Donald Galt Banbury, Oxfordshire SIR – I suspect few members of the Government or non-farmers will know that one acre of oats costs around £200 or more to grow. The yield (which is only once per annum) will vary between one and three tons per acre, depending on weather, disease and rotation. Andrew Goodman (Letters, August 15) states that his oats for porridge were sold at £138 per ton this year. That means you need a lot of acres to make any sort of income from farming. W Ravell Lincoln SIR – An excellent article by Annabel Denham. This Government is taking decisions that will destroy our nation. As the protest signs state: 'No farmers, no food, no future.' David and Sue Woolley Malton, North Yorkshire SIR – Paul Wilson (Letters, August 18) is right to point out that, as a country, we are living beyond our means. However, I cannot agree with his support for inheritance tax. He correctly argues that wealth is gained through house price inflation, then dismisses as 'spurious' the suggestion that this wealth has already been taxed. He is wrong to do so: the cash used to buy one's home comes from taxed income. The fact that houses have performed particularly well as investments is largely a result of successive governments' failure to build enough of them. Demand has exceeded supply. Lack of good planning policies, together with poor economic, industrial and infrastructural policies, have exacerbated the ballooning prices in the South East. It is not homeowners who should take the rap. The population as a whole needs to meet the challenge through fair, broad-based taxation and more stringent spending cuts. Tim Lovett Claygate, Surrey SIR – In an ideal world I might agree with Paul Wilson's support for IHT and other taxes, but unfortunately we do not live in such a world. Nor do we have a government that spends the money we give it wisely. Graeme Brierley Sutton Bridge, Lincolnshire