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How not to a-tractor floating voters – politicalbetting.com
How not to a-tractor floating voters – politicalbetting.com
That means Kemi Badenoch is committed to going into the next election with her two priorities being a tax cut for farmers with proprieties worth over £3 million, and a tax cut for parents of private school children. I'm not sure that's where the Tories need to be. https://t.co/hJIvc4AYeN
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Oh, and first.
The farmer thing (and NI employers hike) has just re-affirmed to me that Reeves is useless, so the Tories are just exploiting that (as they should). We need billions more to fund our wonderful NHS after all.
It comes across as ideological rather than properly thought through, with plenty of unintended consequences to come.
No, the Tories aren’t going to run only on reversing these two changes at the next election, but they’re a damn good starting point.
Truly she has an orchard of magic money trees. Or perhaps she is keen to see how scrapping statutory maternity pay goes down with the public.
These people are useless, get someone in who has had a real job and understands what it takes to run a business never mind a country.
Or is that ’refreshed’?
Remember how many of JCorbz's individual policies were popular. It was the sum total that was implausibly expensive.
There’s lots to unpick in the farming IHT issue but one is the nature and role of farming.
Part of the issue is the PR ‘brand’ of farming, which is positive - they produce our food. But beneath that is an industry in need of reform, as in many ways it has not served the country’s needs efficiently over a very long period of time. And by efficiency I mean maximising food production whilst minimising environmental disbenefits. And one of the issues there is the lack of new ideas as barriers to entry are high and peer pressure to conform also high. iHT might help a smidge with that.
In many ways the popular view of farming is very outdated. Farmers are really land managers responding to markets. And they have fended off regulation by agreeing to voluntary schemes, which are light touch if costly and process heavy, and which they moan about. The Red tape. But by agreeing to red tape it has basically exempted them from proper application of polluter pays. Farming is about growing food. Land management is about maximising the value of assets, be it through producing food, green power, recreation or development. And that is what they are now.
Many farmers are not wealthy, at least cash wealthy. Their income varies. There is uncertainty. But this can be offset by joining environmental schemes. Some are very wealthy and as with all walks of life the tendency has been for the wealthier to get bigger. Land is an asset, and the asset accumulators have moved in, big style. The Dysons. A farmer I know on the edge of a county town made many millions from selling land for development. He immediately started buying land in Wales to offset capital gains.
I tend to agree with the Govt that most smaller farmers who prepare properly will be able to avoid IHT. But to some extent so will the larger ones in time because they will develop accountancy dodges. What does rankle in all this is the way the NFU is treated so much more sympathetically than any other representative Union. A more recidivist and backward looking organisation it would Be hard to find.
They are in danger of shoring up their
baseelitesPlenty of houses can be worth £3m in the sarfeast without being a mansion - its a crazy market. Tax is due, it's probably being sold, sentimental value perhaps but its just a house and the person inheriting almost certainly already owns at least one other.
The farm? Selling up removes the business (unless there are large liquid assets which can go to pay the bill. Selling up realistically means small farms being bought by bigger farms, which changes the farming industry into something that isn't optimal for producing food/drink products which the country needs.
Comparing one to the other is a bit daft...
Also, the Democrats were running for election and failed to present their policies, preferring to lambast the other side. The Conservatives are at the start of years of Opposition. The two scenarios are dissimilar.
The opposition, then, has four and a half years to come up with some intelligent policy to reform land management, as this government doesn't appear to be able to do so.
The signs from Kemi aren't promising on that score, either.
Somebody is in a bubble, but....
I wasn't going to miss an opportunity to use this line
The most dangerous place to stand in Westminster is the space between Kemi Badenoch and a passing bandwagon.
Meanwhile, welcome back Stagflation.
@ONS
Public service productivity in Quarter 2 2024 is estimated to be 8.5% below its pre-#COVID19 pandemic peak in Quarter 4 (Oct to Dec) 2019.
Support For Tariffs on Imports:
Support: 42%
Oppose: 35%
Neutral: 15%
https://x.com/USA_Polling/status/1858912815261905106
And yes we are all in bubbles these days, Every single one of us.
Anyhoo, did you not read the previous thread.
It seems perverse to argue that the Conservatives would benefit from backing this change.
Suspect the answer is CATNIP! I'm HERE! LOOK AT ME!
“the person inheriting almost certainly already owns at least one other” Often they do, but not almost certainly.
“Selling up removes the business (unless there are large liquid assets which can go to pay the bill.” The tax is only on the value above the threshold, so the bill isn’t necessarily so much that selling up would be required. You don’t need liquid assets. If you own land worth that much, you can get a mortgage.
“Selling up realistically means small farms being bought by bigger farms” Small farms won’t be paying taxes. Only ~30% of farms will and they will be the bigger farms. This creates an economic incentive in favour of splitting bigger farms into smaller farms.
“which changes the farming industry into something that isn't optimal for producing food/drink products which the country needs.” What’s you evidence here? Big farms can be more efficient if your aim is to maximise food production.
It's part of opposition politics to jump on bandwagons and be good at it. This was a good one because it was aligned with Tory instincts and policies.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/nov/18/more-than-one-in-three-uk-children-poverty-deprivation-record-high
Yet the print media, the broadcast media, the Conservative Party, Farage and those remaining faithful PB Tories are crying foul over a plan that will see Clarkson, Dyson and Lloyd-Webber pay 20% IHT on estates worth more than £3m. A calculation accepted by everyone but the NFU.
Your last point I can't follow at all, though I think you're accidentally correct. The change makes smaller farms more attractive than bigger ones from a IHT perspective, and my understanding was a small hill farm with some frozen sheep is contributing hardly any calories per acre compared with a large arable farm in Lincolnshire.
Opposition is about offering an alternative. Accepting and supporting the government investment , but none of the means to pay for it is not an alternative.
It was a choice. And that choice can be reversed.
He does it to get a rise out of the Tory right, which seems to be his mission in life.
Best response is simply to ignore it.
Corbyn didn’t clock that. Badenoch is in danger of making the same mistake
The non-taxable status of agricultural land and education had been in place for decades, across multiple administrations, and for very good reason; you raise tax on the things that make sense and not on those that don't.
To simply accept it is to accept a permanent shift to the Left, and Labour's dividing lines.
I see no reason why the Tories should do that.
There isn't much dissent from the PB Tory echo chamber at the moment so perhaps TSE is just throwing a little flavour of Devil's advocate into the mix to keep you lot on your toes.
The Tory leader would need to be very socially liberal, "modernising", low-tax and mildly republican for TSE to not swat at them daily.
But they do have limits, and they know that politicians have to choose. Even in Ireland, flush with cash from booming corporation tax receipts, and a bonus €14bn from the Apple tax case (equivalent to about £150bn in UK budget terms), the voters have started to question the tsunami of spending promises in the current election campaign.
I don't think it was necessarily a mistake for Badenoch to commit to reversing this change, but at some point she will need to show what her choices will be between competing priorities, and how to make everything add up.
https://x.com/fos/status/1859074569153507521?s=61
Shane McMahon is the one I really feel for. He seems a decent person.
a Defender
and I don't mean the modern vehicle assembled in Slovakia
I mean the 60 year old design spannered together in Solihull.
If you give Land Rover a huge wedge, they will find one secondhand and 'refurbish' it, including fitting a V8 motor. None of this electric malarkey...
NEW Inflation jumps, as expected after energy cap rise, but by bit more than expected, as core inflation & services inflation go up a bit… food inflation still falling, but overall headline rate heading up to 3% in next few months…
And housing costs measures highest on record
https://x.com/faisalislam/status/1859150201144971512
Is it about a lack of the smack of firm management, is it the money spent on diversity consultants, or is it that we have solved bottlenecks with the short term fix of extra bodies rather than equipping staff with better tools to achieve more?
My guess (based on the way that capital budgets always get raided to fix crises, and have been for decades, and we're going to be under Hunt) is that the last diagnosis is the main problem.
NHS productivity improved noticeably in the first half of the year and will improve even more second half as the strikes are over:
https://bsky.app/profile/rentouljohn.bsky.social/post/3larflnb4ek2e
Have they asked Bart’s permission ?
https://x.com/ianbremmer/status/1858919249516880366?s=61
The US is in for a horror show if Trump follows through on his trade and tax policies .... it will crash the US economy. We are talking deep deep recession and possibly worse. Populist economic theory is like jumping off a cliff with a balsa wood handglider 🤣🤣🤣🤣😅😅😅 You cannot stimulate demand, cut supply, increase borrowing and eliminate saving, and unpick the institutional framework of the business environment and undercut your currency's global reserve status in one go.
And I don't see him not following through, now he has congress, senate and the Supreme court and Schedule F. America is looking at its own Liz Truss moment here - but much much worse.
https://www.ft.com/content/67a36786-8c79-41a2-8f22-3092b0a74d19?accessToken=--sanitized--&sharetype=gift&token=--sanitized--&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2q-xeeo-UVWwq-HKw8CYkKOowa3niEz_MxrFaY3oe5nEM_OGNGVvUcQ8U_aem__rbkht2RscW_RUSTwMlx8A
And this is just one dimension of his presidency. There is also education and research, migration, security, and environment all with equal capacity to cause cascading crises. As usual the best way to defeat right wing populists is to put them in power and let them destroy themselves - but at what cost to the rest of us???
No party wins general elections without shoring up their core vote first and for Tories they include private school parents and farmers. Voters also want a choice not an echo, if you want to hammer farmers with inheritance tax and hit private school parents with VAT you vote Labour anyway and if the Tories don't stand up for farmers and private school parents they will leak voters to Reform and the LDs who will.
Plus 57% of voters oppose the hated tractor tax anyway
https://x.com/LukeTryl/status/1858787981303185664
Not to mention VAT on school fees will just reduce the scholarships they provide and hit smaller schools most making them even more exclusive. While we need family farms to produce our food, you can't make food from houses. Most farms may be asset rich but they are income poor
If the Tories are serious about re-entering government, they need to do less kneejerk, and more thinking.
The chances are (though given the inherent advantages if the U.S. economy, it's not certain) that Trump is about to test to destruction emotion based policy.
By the time of the next election the electorate aren't going to thank you for anemic growth and fewer jobs.
None of this will stop me from WFH today, of course.
So it will work for Starmer if the economy is in at least okay shape, with noticeable improvements in public services. But if that isn't the case, and people conclude that Labour have taken the country in the wrong direction, then reflexively opposing everything Labour have done isn't going to be a problem for Badenoch.
It just also happens to be his hobby.
It’s a sort of inverse Malthusian crisis.
It’s definitely a challenge for our new joiners and graduate entry too.
What happens next is more relevant.
Are we about to see a repeat of Hoover ?
> Economic unease
> Republicans win the Presidency
> Implement tariffs
> Economy tanks more
> Democrats sweep next election
> Pics unreleated
https://x.com/USA_Polling/status/1858977306506916303
Of course the difference is that Trump is inheriting a remarkable strong economy, with currently low inflation, from the Democrats.
They offered her a traineeship but she, rightly in my view, came to the conclusion that she would not learn from that in the same way as she would in the office and she went for a private firm instead. Her current job has her in court pretty much every day and has given her a vast range of experience she simply would not have got with the SSSC who were offering her more money. The management there were genuinely surprised when she turned them down.
It'll save Scott a lot of time
I just do not like the word hate directed at any politician
I do not hate Starmer or Reeves but I certainly dislike their actions to date and they are a huge disappointment
I also disagree with the header not least because Badenoch clear opposition to both the farmers IHT and vat on school fees is in line with conservative thinking on both.
It was said yesterday that the farmers IHT would provide £500 million to the treasury and that is a drop in the ocean to reverse and it really does ask the question why did labour think upsetting farmers was a good political choice
https://news.sky.com/story/scottish-labour-pledge-to-reverse-starmers-winter-fuel-payment-cut-if-they-take-over-in-holyrood-13256553