Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It is very disappointing to hear that. Our experience of GLAS payments for 2016 was that commitments were made that the farmers would be paid in December but this has not happened. That has rolled into this year. There are many farmers - up to 5,000 at the moment - in a very difficult position because of this. Regarding the Department's operation of the scheme and the learning of lessons from it, I would have expected that we could be crystal clear about those 14,000 farmers who have signed up for GLAS III and what percentage of their payments they will get this year. They would have assumed in fairness that there would be a sufficient budget in place so that when they signed up at the end of last year to start the scheme this January, they could rightfully expect to be paid and not be subject to the kinds of delays we have seen recently because there is not sufficient funding in the budget.