Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the two bodies for their presentations.

As Deputy Ferris said, there seem to be many problems arising regarding land eligibility and the ability of farmers to enter schemes and maximise their incomes from them. It seems crazy that farmers are being penalised for managing a commonage destocking plan and cannot qualify for the new scheme because of their compliance with the previous scheme. It seems to make no sense. Farmers in west Donegal have problems getting land included in GLAS and maximising their payments under the scheme because they do not have enough variety of grass species.

This issue must urgently be addressed, given that it will have a major impact on very large areas. Is this the experience along the whole of the west coast? Perhaps the agricultural consultants could expand on this. The solution seems to be for the farmers' organisations, consultants and Department to get together and come up with a working arrangement for how it can be resolved. What are the witnesses' views on this and how do they see it working? Do they believe the Department would be willing to engage with them? What can the committee do to move it along and make it a reality?