A minister has said plans would be set out to deal with food shortages if farmers go ahead with their threat to strike over inheritance tax plans.
Transport secretary Louise Haigh has said contingency plans would be drawn up to ensure “food security” if action escalates.
However, the government has downplayed concerns that there could be food shortages as a result - with farming minister Daniel Zeichner urging “calm” over the issue.
Farmers have criticised Rachel Reeves’s budget which plans for inheritance tax thresholds to be extended for two more years until 2030, allowing the first £325,000 of any estate to remain tax-free before being taxed at 40 per cent.
They have argued that they are bearing the brunt of a system that the mega-wealthy exploit to avoid paying tax.
Protests have been held with Will White, a farm sustainability coordinator at Sustain, has said those inheriting family farms will be unfairly hit.
Celebrity farmer Jeremy Clarkson has joined the bandwagon, saying the government has a “sinister plan” to “cleanse” farmland.
The government has said “the majority of those claiming relief will not be affected by these changes,” and claimed it has a “fair and balanced” approach.
Mr Zeichner told BBC Politics East: “I urge people to look calmly at the details and I think they will find that the vast majority will be fine.
“The figures from the Treasury are very clear: under 500 farms a year are likely to be affected.
“And I would say to people: take advice because every person’s situation is different and there will be many, many people who will find they are not actually going to be caught by this.”
According to Yahoo News, one farmer’s group has even suggested that members should not supply food to supermarkets until the inheritance tax call is reversed.
The National Farmers' Union has not supported this battle cry but did tell Sky News’s Trevor Phillips on Sunday: “They keep on saying 73 per cent of farms won't be impacted, but when you look at the farms that are producing the country's food, a significant proportion of those farms, Defra's own figures suggest 66 per cent are over the million pound threshold, and these are farms that are producing the country's food."
Ms Haigh has said she is not concerned about food shortages.
Also appearing on Mr Phillips’s magazine show, she said: Haigh said: "we put forward food security really as a priority, and we'll work with farmers and the supply chain in order to ensure that.
“The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs will be setting out plans for the winter and setting out - as business as usual - be setting out contingency plans and ensuring that food security is treated as the priority it deserves to be."
