Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Yes, but it is not demand-led without a backstop. We have only so much money to spend. We are looking to increase horticulture grant aid. We are importing a lot of horticulture in Ireland. We provide for only approximately 60% of our domestic needs here. We can increase that. That is why we are examining grant aiding the development of more horticultural facilities such as polytunnels and glass houses.

A number of people asked about the harbours funds. We have two ways of supporting the physical development of harbours. My Department is responsible for, and owns on behalf of the State, seven fisheries harbours. We need to invest in the infrastructure of those harbours. Killybegs is the biggest, then Castletownbere and we have many others such as Rossaveal, Greencastle, Howth and Dunmore East. There is an ongoing maintenance requirement there and some capital projects that we are trying to spend money on. We have a second programme where we work with local authorities who apply for marine access projects, mainly around fishing, but not solely. We provide 75% co-funding for local authorities for projects up to a certain value. Last year and the year before, local authorities applied for that financial support and we have given it as much as we can support.

Following the storm damage of the last number of weeks I have made the case in Cabinet and outside it that this model might be a good model for repairing some of the storm damage to the coastal harbours that have been affected. We have done quite some work with local authorities in 92 piers and harbours to get an assessment of physical damage we might be able to support. The Government will make a collective response in terms of resources that will be available for that work, along with the Ministers, Deputies Brian Hayes and Hogan.

We will not provide money for survey work and consultants for fisheries harbours. If local authorities want to develop their harbours they can do the ground work first in terms of surveys or consultancy. I insist on spending our money on physical work. It is a stimulus. It is about creating jobs in coastal communities around the country. We have a relatively small amount of money to spend and I want it to be spent on physical construction jobs around harbours, piers, access points, slipways, walkways and rock armour. They are the kind of projects we have been supporting. If we had more money we would also look at supporting some of the survey work required, but we do not. A local authority can make a special case to us, for example if there is a special reason around marine safety, such as the need for a harbour to be dredged. Generally we support physical construction activity and that is the best way to spend our limited resources. It is small money in the bigger scheme of things.

We have revised the Estimate for Irish Seed Savers upwards by 15%. One would not think that looking at the Seed Savers campaign on social media and the questions asked of me. It is the right thing to do. It is an important organisation but it also needs to find ways it can help to fund itself. We cannot pay for everything. There are very few examples where I have decided to increase anybody's budget by 15%. We made that decision virtually overnight because we had overlooked it during the budget debates. The Deputy raised it with me and so we responded to it.

Flooded farm land exists not only in County Clare. There has been much physical damage to agricultural land right along the western seaboard. OPW has primary responsibility for managing floods and ensuring we take action to reduce the effects of floods in the future. Essentially a climate-change adaptation strategy is required. It is very expensive and OPW has limited resources and must prioritise how it spends them. If the Deputy is asking me whether the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine can provide capital resources for reinstating farmland that has been washed away, that is a difficult ask. There will be a collective response from Government on the overall flood damage. That will come in approximately a fortnight's time.

Deputy Pat Deering referred to TAMS. There have been issues and there was an underspend last year. I would like the full amount of €20 million to be drawn down, but that did not happen because farmers decided, for whatever reason, that they did not want to spend. In the first half of the year we had terrible weather and they experienced fodder problems and a horsemeat crisis and confidence in the sector to borrow and invest in farms was knocked because many farmers had debts linked with the fodder issue and so on. The second half of the year was much more positive and dairy farmers were more willing to invest in building projects. I am hopeful this year that optimism will result in a full draw-down, particularly in the dairy sector which is preparing for quota abolition in April 2015. This is the time to invest in dairy farms and plan for expansion and increased herds and milk volume. That is why we are providing a strong TAMS programme again this year. I am hopeful more money will be drawn down this year than last year. However, it is a demand-led scheme and we cannot force farmers to participate, although there are sufficient incentives in place to draw down the money. We do not need to improve the scheme because it is a good one as it is.

There were other reasons farmers did not draw down the money last year. There was a pig welfare issue which posed a problem. Pig farmers must have loose sow housing. This is a welfare requirement laid down by the Commission and we are grant-aiding pig farmers to upgrade their facilities to comply with it. Many of them secured planning permission, but they could not physically get the works done in time with the contractors and we extended the deadline for compliance until the end of February. Much of the TAMS money earmarked for the sow welfare loose housing scheme has been deferred to this year and it will be drawn down. Extending the deadline led to an easing off of sow welfare expenditure, but this was done for all the right reasons. It would have been rushed if we had not done this. I am reasonably confident that all of the money allocated under TAMS will be drawn down this year. I cannot say this for sure, but the figure will be higher than last year.

Deputy Willie Penrose referred to the new RDP. I answered the question on installation aid.

Deputy Tom Barry asked about bioenergy My Department and the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources have been in constant discussions about a bioenergy strategy and how to link with the Food Harvest 2020 strategy and so on. There are more problems around miscanthus than willow, but we need to examine what is working elsewhere because the energy crops initiative, particularly miscanthus, has not been successful in Ireland. It does not pay a person to transport the bulk material to Bord na Móna for co-firing and so on unless he or she is harvesting near Edenderry. Some farmers have sprayed the crop and are ploughing in. We have amended the rules to permit them to do this without paying a clawback penalty to the Department for the grants they received, but it is still not a satisfactory scenario. Energy crops probably need more consideration and to be the subject of another debate.