Both Wates Group director Sir James Wates and Hill Group founder/chief executive Andy Hill have spoken out about the impact that inheritance tax reforms announced in last week’s budget will have on their family firms.
In the budget chancellor Rachel Reeves announced that inheritance tax relief on private assets and businesses will be capped at £1m from April 2026. While £1m sounds like a lot of money, in the context of businesses like farms or property & construction, it doesn’t cover much of the asset value.
Quoted by The Times newspaper, Sir James Wates said: “People will say what is the point of carrying on. Do I want to hand on this poisoned legacy to future generations? It makes it ripe and fair game for overseas investors to come in and pick up very good businesses on the cheap because the aspiration goes. I think that is awful.”
James Wates is part of the fourth generation of his family to run the company and was chairman from 2013 to 2023; the fifth generation is already coming through.
Andy Hill, 66, has no intention of giving up yet but has two sons, Greg and Tom, in their mid-late thirties alongside him in the business.
Hill told The Times that they would “have to find the best part of £100m” to take on the family business, adding: “They’ve got no chance.”
Hill said: “It’s a family business and the plan was never to sell. I voted Labour mainly because the housing system was broken and I thought we needed a change.”
However, he said that he was not going to suddenly sell his business because of the inheritance tax changes. He thinks that the government will be forced into a U-turn when it realises the scale of the mistake that Reeves has made.
“I think at some point they will change it back,” Hill said. “I don’t think it’s been thought through.”
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