Noel Harrington (Cork South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their presentations. Various issues arise from these presentations and previous ones, including the subjective nature of land eligibility, the criteria to be applied and how they should be assessed, consistency in dealing with them, and a lack of clarity, particularly from the point of view of a farmer who is a sole operator looking to fill out his basic payment and area aid forms. At the moment there is a lack of clarity, and they are looking for some sensible proposals. There seems to be a trend or a theme coming through the presentations today, and previous presentations, on how this problem can be addressed, whether it be through a focus group, a working group, a round table group, a forum, or, as some people have suggested because of the timeframe, through the prompt issuing of guidelines by the Minister and the Department.

This issue came to my attention 15 months or so ago in west Cork. I accept that we are a long way down the road and that we may be at the last hour. It may be that it would be difficult to put a forum together. However, I also see a huge downside in the approach whereby the Department and the Minister decide in the next couple of weeks to issue guidelines and a set of criteria. Such an approach will not be universally accepted. Whatever is going to happen, be it a forum or a directive or guideline issued by the Minister, a line will be drawn in terms of the criteria for eligibility for this land. There will be a line and a timeframe, and a huge cohort of people will be on the wrong side of that line. Even though we are at very last hour of this process, we should work on achieving an approach based on consensus. I neglected to mention the ACA, Teagasc and other stakeholders. They should be involved in finding a binding consensus in terms of criteria and a timeframe in respect of land eligibility. Among the farmers I have dealt with, this would have a far greater chance of succeeding than an edict by the Minister about what is going to happen, where the line is and that a farmer is either inside or outside it, even if marginally so, as the case may be.

Given that context, and having regard to the presentations that have been made, it is clear that the organisations know exactly what the problems are. Their solutions, while broadly similar, will be different. There will be differences in how the different organisations and stakeholders will approach this problem. A guideline from on high will probably suit nobody. Perhaps I am like Don Quixote tilting at windmills, and it might never work. However, the best approach would be to have a forum that would achieve widespread stakeholder consensus, which would give certainty to farmers in respect of their payments over the next five or six years.