The 1,500 tractors that descended on six locations across NI last Saturday as part of a UK-wide protest against reforms to inheritance tax (IHT) are a reminder to government that farmers will not go away quietly, Ulster Farmers’ Union President William Irvine has said.

“I suspect if it hadn’t been for the weather, we would have seen more than that. But we made the statement we wanted to make. We put the issue back on the agenda,” Irvine told UFU members in Coleraine on Monday night.

He said more meetings with politicians are planned in the coming weeks, as the UK farming unions ramp up efforts to get changes made to proposed IHT reforms, due to be implemented from April 2026. However, as yet, UK chancellor Rachel Reeves and her Treasury officials have not accepted any meeting requests.

Key date

The next key date is the Chancellor’s spring forecast, due to be delivered on 26 March 2025.

Irvine said that the spring statement is an opportunity for the Labour government to announce a change of direction, but if nothing is forthcoming by then, it sends a message to farm leaders that something different will have to be done.