Mr. Tom Canning:

The difficulty with the EPA approach is the management is of a catchment area. If we take a large catchment where one or two farmers do not cause a problem as regards nutrient loss, it will not be reflected in the whole catchment area. It would be possible that 90% of the farmers comply with the regulations and for there still to be a problem with water quality. A number of factors affect water quality, such as hydrology, hydromorphology, as Mr. Fennell mentioned, soil type and climate. Each of these factors can have an effect so we need to look at a trend over a period rather than taking a snapshot as we did in 2022. A trend was not measured then and we are going to take another snapshot in 2024 using the metrics that were applied previously. We need to give the regulations time, but we also need a change in management practice. That is where organisations such as ours need to be involved along with our counterparts in Teagasc. We all have the same aim. We work closely together, but we need to feel we can be involved and that we can bring our client base in, who, as the lad says, are currently being disadvantaged in this whole process and being denied information. We are simply not getting it and not being involved.