HMRC has just produced a new guide on tax advice for farmers.

Most farms in this country already benefit from a relatively benign tax regime. Even after changes to the CAP regime those that are clued up can also take advantage of grants to manage their assets; I know people personally who have left their main career, bought some land, and been amazed at what's available to you as a grant to spend on your own assets if you are "farming".

It seems to me that vets need more tax advice than farmers do: Many vets will work all their lives, pay 40% tax, and end up with a net worth below that of the average farmer.

Farming can be a hard life, but then large animal veterinary practice can also be hard: Many farmers already get their vehicles through the business, fuel for their vehicles through their businesses, fuel for their homes, even much of their own food.

Is tax advice really what they need?

If a farmer needed "tax advice" should he or she really be looking for advice from HMRC? Or will HMRC just "advise" them to pay more tax.

The new Guide for farmers from HMRC talks of "starting your own business". With the recent fall in milk price I think it's likely that many dairy farmers at the moment will have little choice but to leave the industry, sell or diversify.

I suspect what dairy farmers need more than tax advice is a competition regime that allows them to form effective cooperatives. The concessions made in Europe by British Governments over the last couple of decades resulted in the dissolution of the milk marketing board and eliminated dairy farmers' most powerful"cooperative". In theory the Milk Marketing Board was anticompetitive as it had a dominant position in the UK. In practice British farmers were competing in a European market and dissolution of the MMB left them vulnerable to the supermarkets.