Mr. Bill Callanan:

The vast majority of farms in this country are family farmed. A small minority are larger farms.

I will address the issue of banding, which is what the Deputy is getting at. From our perspective, we were operating a single band across all cows. Administratively, that was easy for us. People might not realise it, but the Department performs an administrative check on every single farm for nitrates compliance. The checks are not universal, but we perform checks comparing single farm payments versus farms' animal identification and movement, AIM, data, that is, their livestock, in respect of every farm in the country. It is a large check and quite a number of farmers are non-compliant and suffer a penalty as a consequence.

Moving from a single band will be a challenge, but we are putting our hand up to do that. At European level, most countries were working a banding system and the Commission was adamant that it was a minimum requirement in terms of discussions-----