The impact of a will, especially if the person has left their estate split unequally between siblings, can last for years – to avoid that kind of problem, families need to communicate with each other early on.

There may be very good reasons why a parent wants to leave their estate in unequal parts, but I always encourage people to talk it through first or, if they really can’t face having that conversation, at least to leave a letter explaining their actions.

Although I deal with wills and probate a good deal of the time, powers of attorney are increasingly important documents too – because so many people face issues such as dementia and Alzheimer’s, it’s really important to make sure that we choose people to deal with our affairs for us. We all know how annoying it is when we want to change something about a bill which is in someone else’s name – imagine facing that difficulty across all your financial and health care issues.

Because I used to be an agricultural nutritionist, I really enjoy dealing with farming families – that’s my own background, and I must admit to feeling entirely at home in my wellies in a field.

Farming families often have particular issues to deal with when dividing their estate between their children – how do you value the work one child has done on the farm while the others were away doing different jobs, for instance?

Above all, I want to make sure that people can leave their hard-earned money to those they choose, and as little as legally possible to HMRC – no one loves the taxman that much.