Member

Despite the direct payments withdrawal, average farm business income for the latest available years of the transition period—2022-23 to 2024-25—was approximately £75,000 in real terms. That was higher than the pre-transition average calculated in 2018-19 to 2020-21, which was approximately £60,500 in real terms. To confirm, as I said earlier, the money released by reducing delinked payments is not being lost to the sector; it is being reinvested through our other schemes for farmers and land managers. We are transparent about how the money is being used. As I say, we publish an annual farming and countryside programme, which shows in detail how the farming budget has been spent. Last year’s was published in September and we will publish the next one later this year.