South West Norfolk MP Terry Jermy says he has visited more than 100 of the 500 farms in his constituency since he was elected in 2024.

Their concerns range from inheritance tax, water security, soaring costs and climate change, to the continued uncertainty around farm payments, following last week's chaotic scramble for Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) applications which left many farmers missing out on funding for nature projects.

Mr Jermy has raised these issues within the Farming APPG (all-party parliamentary group), which he chairs, and he is also one of 45 MPs in the Labour Rural Research Group - which has sent a list of policy "asks" to chancellor John Healey ahead of his first budget on October 28.

The list includes calls to "provide longer-term certainty over the farming and land management budgets", to expand investment in farm productivity and resilience, and to "make agricultural water resilience a budget priority" - a point underlined by this summer's searing drought.

It also urges support for "viable farm succession and investment" - amid continued industry campaigns for a reversal of controversial cuts to farm inheritance tax relief.

Also included are requests to boost public procurement of British foods, invest in rural transport, accelerate the delivery of affordable rural housing, close the rural connectivity and energy infrastructure gap and establish a rural climate adaptation investment programme.

But Mr Jermy said the fundamental priority must be to improve the profitability of struggling........

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