Yorkshire Shepherdess: Labour IHT raid means ‘hard times’ for family farms

The Yorkshire Shepherdess has said family farms will face “hard times” ahead because of Labour’s inheritance tax raid.

Amanda Owen, who stars in Channel 5’s fly-on-the-wall documentary Our Yorkshire Farm, also said many people “don’t realise the reality” of farming finances.

Ms Owen’s comments come after Jeremy Clarkson led more than 10,000 farmers at a huge Westminster demonstration against the tax raid.

Under government plans, inheritance tax relief for farmers will be capped at £1 million from April 2026, with a rate of 20 per cent of inheritance tax being charged after that.

Speaking to The Sunday Times, Ms Owen said the tax measures “affect the kind of farms that people like to see, the family farms. The huge, great big farm businesses will have to find their way through it”.

Under the rules, farmers will be able to gift their farm to family members tax-free if they do so at least seven years before their death. However, campaigners say many elderly farmers fear they will not have this option.

Ms Owen said she predicted “hard times” ahead, saying “People look at farms and they see the Land Rover, they see the farmhouse, they see the land, and they think, ‘Oh, they’ve got it made.’ They don’t realise the reality”.

In 2022, Ms Owen and her husband Clive said they had taken the “difficult decision to separate”. However, the pair have continued to run their farm, co-parent and film together. They have nine children, and are tenant farmers.

“Even for farmers that do own places, it doesn’t mean that you’re not living hand to mouth,” she said. “You’re so susceptible to whatever’s going on. From week to week, prices change. The markets are very volatile.

“There is only one thing that is a dead cert – and that’s the price of everything that you put in going up.”