Is this the end of the family farm?

Rural groups claim reform will hit most farms hard but tax experts say only the richest will be affected

Illustration of a farmer holding a sheep in a barren field
Rachel Reeves announced in the Budget that inheritance tax relief on farms will be limited to £1 million
(Image credit: Illustration by Stephen Kelly / Getty Images)

Farmers are threatening to pour buckets of manure over Westminster and bring the country "to its knees" after Rachel Reeves announced cuts to tax relief on agricultural estates.

Angry campaigners claim that the changes announced in the Budget marked "the end of family farms", but some tax experts said only the wealthiest would be affected.

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  Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.