Mr. Paul O'Brien:

The Deputy mentioned building confidence. From a farmer's point of view, the ambition of the farmer has always been higher than the ambition of the State. Going back to the previous REPS, which has been spoken about, there were 70,000 farmers in REPS in the 2000s. Taking a look at where we are today, 30,000 farmers were originally pencilled in for ACRES but 46,000 farmers applied. More farmers would have applied if they were given encouragement and told they would get through the system. It has always been a case of if the design is there and if the ambition is to provide an opportunity for farmers to engage in an environmental scheme, they will go on it. History has shown that 70,000 farmers in the past did that.

Building confidence is going to be difficult because at the moment, the only way the nature restoration law looks likely to be implemented is with the main financing tool from that being the Common Agricultural Policy. That only brings us to 2027. If we are asking farmers to go on this scheme, to rewet and reinstate land and do all these other things, that would go up to 2050. There would need to be considerably longer-----