Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

With regard to overclaims, as the Minister is probably aware, I was at a meeting in west Cork a week or so ago, attended by more than 400 people farmers from west Cork. Many of them claimed they are losing between €3,000 and €5,000 as a consequence of this. That might be the accumulated figure or the yearly figure, I am not sure but I will work on the basis of the accumulated figure. Most of these people are low-income farmers and are totally dependent on this income. Many of those to whom I spoke after the meeting stated categorically that the claims they submitted were claims that were agreed with the Department. They did nothing wrong in their eyes. They were claims the Department approved in terms of what they were claiming for and they now find they are being penalised for overclaiming and retrospective payments are being taken from them. The consequences of this affects not only the applicant-recipient but also the wider community. I have attended many meetings over the years and the farmers at this meeting were very angry. They were angry with the Minister, the Department, local representatives and the leadership of the farming organisations. The problem with this is the retrospective aspect of it. The farmers firmly believe that they did nothing wrong, the Department was well aware of the position from their previous maps and so forth. These digital maps were approved by the Department and now they find themselves in this position. Is there any flexibility the Minister can exercise to alleviate this problem? I do not see how they can be penalised if they were compliant. I understand that the non-compliance comes as a result satellite readings but pre-satellite readings they were complaint.