Our political priorities for 2025

The UK Government has started 2025 with a mission to reverse its ailing start and falling polling numbers. We are, however, still seeing its failure to understand the rural economy in much of its governance.

For the CLA public affairs team, the main priority remains the reversal of the changes to agricultural property relief and business property relief as announced in the budget.

Following intensive lobbying, numerous meetings with ministers and MPs and over 5,000 media hits, our response to the budget has moved into its second phase. Even with the weight of evidence against it, the government remains entrenched in its position. This has encouraged us to work on different avenues, both inside and out of Parliament, to urge the government to soften and reverse its position.

One such avenue came to fruition this week. Following conversations with the CLA, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) released a document which noted the "high uncertainty” about the revenue the tax changes would bring in and noted the difficulty older people would have in responding to the changes. This is pertinent as work from the OBR has often been used to support tax changes – either by the Chancellor or Prime Minister.

It is also welcome that organisations in the wider supply chain, such as major UK supermarkets, have woken up to the threat of these changes following conversations with the CLA.

Looking forward there are other areas of concern that we are looking to mitigate.

The Renters’ Rights Bill has its second reading in the House of Lords on 4 February. This provides an opportunity for a longer review of the legislation, which was rushed through the Commons by the government. We will now be working with peers in the Lords to put forward amendments that smooth out some of the roughest edges of the bill. Before it is passed into law, the CLA will be hosting a webinar and providing advice on the next steps for members.

Following a slow start, the CLA is looking to support the government in achieving its primary ambition to deliver growth.

A great opportunity to do this will be the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, which is expected to be introduced in March. The initial soundings from this bill are positive, with the government announcing that they will reform planning rules to speed up development while still protecting the environment. It was also welcome to hear the Environment Secretary at the Oxford Farming Conference commit to ensuring permitted development rights work better for farmers, a long-term call from the CLA.

These reforms are especially vital following the somewhat underwhelming changes to the National Planning Policy Framework. The CLA is lobbying to ensure that all planning reforms also support members residing within National Parks or National Landscapes. We have already written on this to the Environment Secretary and will continue to raise it to parliamentarians who have National Parks or National Landscapes in their constituencies.

Further ahead there are also opportunities in Labour’s skills and devolution work. Labour has published two policy papers, the Get Britain Working White Paper and English Devolution White Paper, which set out their visions in these areas. We were however disappointed to see a focus on urban areas in these pieces. The CLA will work to ensure that the intricacies of rural areas are considered in any future legislation, starting with when the English Devolution Bill enters Parliament later this year.

We will be ensuring that these points and many others are emphasised to MPs at our parliamentary drop-in next Tuesday. Look out to see our summary of it soon.