THERE has been a lot about the so called 'family farm tax' in the media recently which needs to be challenged. Firstly the new £1m cap on inheritance tax relief is in addition to existing thresholds, so the effective total is £2m. It's also per person, so if the farm is owned by a married couple then the total is £3m.

The tax is only payable on the margin over that and a rate of 20 percent - half the normal IHT rate, and they get 10 years to pay it, interest free. For those over the threshold there are many ways to avoid the tax which accountants will be very familiar with.

This is not designed to hit family farms and it won't. It is designed to hit rich investors who take advantage of the agricultural exemption to avoid paying tax.

People like Jeremy Clarkson who openly admitted to this when he bought his farm, and James Dyson who owns 36,000 acres of prime farmland. It will also hit big estates traditionally owned by the aristocracy and handed down tax free through the generations.

If some of these estates get broken up as a result, or less rich people buy land, that can only be good for genuine farmers and those who aspire to be farmers.

Doug Clark Cononley