Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of halting changes to the threshold for agricultural property relief and business property relief.

The Government published information about the reforms to agricultural property relief and business property relief at www.gov.uk/government/publications/agricultural-property-relief-and-business-property-relief-reforms.

In 2021-22, the most recent year for which data is available, the median value of assets qualifying for agricultural property relief was £486,000 and three-quarters of estates claimed for agricultural property below £1 million. The data also shows that a very small number of claimants each year claim a very significant amount of relief – 40 per cent of the total Exchequer cost of the relief went to the top seven per cent of claims. It is not fair to maintain such a significant relief for a very small number of claimants, when this money could better be used to fund our public services.