Sheffield's Lord Blunkett joins with former PM David Cameron to support farmers and rural communities
Campaigners are continuing to petition against a 20 per cent inheritance tax on farms
A former Sheffield MP who continues to sit in the House of Lords has voiced his support for farmers after an event in Westminster.
Lord David Blunkett was joined by former Prime Minister David Cameron at the event on Monday, September 14, where campaigners called on a “rural reset”.
It comes as campaigners have called on Labour to reverse a number of previous decisions, including the introduction of a 20 per cent tax on inherited agricultural assets worth more than £2.5 million in April this year.
"I think the family tax, the family farm imposition, was a mistake," Lord Blunkett, who served as Home Secretary between 2001 and 2004, said to the BBC.
Recent polling from ORB, commissioned by the Countryside Alliance, found that 15 per cent of those living in rural communities thought that the Labour party cares about the people that live and work there.
Mo Metcalf-Fisher, director of External Affairs at the Countryside Alliance said: "Scrapping the disastrous family farm tax would be a much welcome first step in beginning to repair the Government's approach to the countryside, which for the last two years has been damaging both to rural communities and to Labour’s standing in the countryside.
“We need an urgent reset across rural issues."