Somerset TPA supporters gathered on a chilly, windy morning at the Frome Agricultural & Cheese Show. Between dogs herding geese and parading livestock, we gathered 130 signatures from visitors to the show and farming trade stands urging the Chancellor to cut the Cider Duty Escalator that puts the price of cider up every year.
‘How very rude,’ said one local when we told them that the Chancellor had cut the Beer Duty Escalator, following our campaign earlier in the year, but not the Cider Duty Escalator. She then handed the petition to all her family to sign.
Earlier in the week, the TPA was invited to attend the All-Party Parliamentary Cider Group at the Houses of Parliament. Labour MP Ben Bradshaw mingled with Conservative Peer Lord King, who is also a cider maker just outside Bath, but ‘purely for family consumption!’
Ian Liddell-Grainger, MP for Bridgwater and Chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Cider Group, and Paul Bartlett, Chairman of the National Association of Cider Makers, hosted the event and both endorsed our campaign to end the Cider Duty Escalator. ‘This is very important to the future of cider making,’ said Bartlett to the assembled politicians and senior cider industry executives.
‘The campaign to cut Beer Duty was a real success,’ says Cheltenham MP Martin Horwood. ‘It would be great for the West Country—including Cheltenham—if we could pull off the same trick with Cider. I'm delighted to be supporting local business, fairer taxes and responsible drinking all in one go!’
Please support our campaign by signing our petition at CutCiderTax.Org