Employees from JCB’s farming businesses in Staffordshire were given a day off work to join the rally in London yesterday in support of farmers affected by changes in inheritance tax.
Almost 40 employees boarded a 5am JCB coach to London with a host of other Staffordshire farmers for a rally in the capital. The group included employees of JCB Farms and Wootton Estates based at Wootton, Staffordshire, where JCB farms cereals, vegetables, beef, sheep and chickens organically.
“We have been supplying farmers with machinery since the day JCB was founded in 1945, so what happens to our customers and the farming community is of great importance to us,” comments JCB chairman Anthony Bamford.
“We are very concerned that farmers should be prejudiced against in this way, but more than anything, it is crucial that food from Britain feeds our nation as not all the food we need can come from abroad. The planned changes pose a real threat to farmers, and to food production, as some small family farms quite simply won’t be able to find the money to pay inheritance tax.”
“JCB is one of only two tractor manufacturers in Britain and the only British manufacturer of telescopic handlers, which are used on virtually every farm in this country, so food production is highly significant to the British people and it’s highly important to us as a business.”
Picture: JCB chairman Lord Bamford with some of the JCB employees ahead of their trip to London.
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