FORESTRY is to hang on to its tax relief on red diesel – contrary to Westminster whisperings ahead of the UK Budget.

Detailing his inaugural fiscal package last month, Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced plans to encourage greener alternatives to fossil fuels, including removing tax relief on diesel for certain industries, but pointedly left agriculture (which includes forestry) alone.

Mr Sunak said: “The red diesel scheme allows selected users to pay duty of just over 11p per litre for diesel compared to almost 58p per litre for everyone else. But the sectors using red diesel are some of the biggest contributors to our air quality problem, omitting nearly 10 per cent of the noxious gases polluting the air in our cities like London.

“It has been a £2.4 billion tax break for pollution which has also hindered the development of cleaner alternatives, so I will abolish the tax relief for most sectors.

“I have heard the concerns about agriculture particularly from the NFU and rural colleagues and have decided that agriculture will retain the relief. I’ll also keep the relief for rail, for domestic heating and there will be no impact on fishing.”

The Chancellor also announced the government would be putting £640 million behind its tree planting target.

Reacting to the news, Stuart Goodall, CEO of Confor, said: “It’s a positive statement of intent that ministers are serious about planting trees to tackle the climate emergency, reduce flood risk and rejuvenate our rural economies.”

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