Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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I apologise to the Chairman and the Minister for my late arrival. I had mechanical trouble with the car on the way up. I did not get the full import of what the Minister said and I regret that. That said, I call on the Minister to answer some questions here or else to get me the information. As the trilogue decides things is it possible to make known publicly what has been decided, or is it the policy that nothing is decided until everything is decided and that any agreement remains a secret until everything is decided? As the thing progresses people are keen to know where exactly we are going.

The Minister referred to political agreement by the end of June. Is that an agreement whereby the Council, the Commission and the Parliament have come to the end of their negotiations and have a package that the negotiators have agreed on? Do the Council of Ministers and the Parliament have to go back for ratification? In the case of the Council of Ministers I imagine that would be easy enough but perhaps the Minister will let us know when that is likely to happen. Are we likely to see the Parliament sign off on this agreement this side of the summer or is it likely to go into the autumn? Will the Minister outline when that will be decided and when the three parties will have agreed it in their plenary sessions? I gather there will then be something of a delay in drawing up the final regulation and that it must then be endorsed by the three sides as being a fair reflection on what was agreed. How long is it likely to take before we have the final signed and sealed version and before each country will know the choices and can begin to make choices from the menu?

My understanding is that there has been a strong case made for as wide a menu as possible. Can the Minister confirm that no matter what happens it is a given that, for example, a flat rate payment is a possibility because countries have it already and the Commission wants it? In that case there may be several menus including redistributive payments or a minimum payment like the internal convergence. The flat rate payment will be in the mix anyway. Then each country would have to decide whether it wanted to level off the playing pitch.

The Minister might be able to give us some clarity on another issue that seems to be of considerable concern to the Irish Farmers Association. If I had any doubts about it, the matter would be a considerable concern to me too. I am referring to the issue of co-funding for rural development. Can I take it that it would be most unlikely that any Government of this country would leave European money after it because it could not come up with co-funding? Can I take it that the likelihood is that the Government will match all the co-funding under the rural development programme as required? I cannot conceive of any Government that would leave behind what is effectively free money but the Minister needs to put the matter to bed because I keep getting pleas from the IFA to the effect that there is considerable uncertainty about it. I suppose there may be technical uncertainty but I do not imagine that the Minister would go there and I doubt he will. It would be useful if the Minister could clarify the matter subject to the usual caveats that any Minister must set down.

Given what was agreed in the Multiannual Financial Framework, MFF, is it possible to give the committee ballpark figures on the Pillar 2 side and what they would mean in terms of disadvantaged area payments, REPS payments or agri-environment options scheme payments and so on? With the single payment it is easy to do a direct comparison between this time and last time. However, there was heavy co-funding or over-funding in the beginning and now there is a clawback. As a result it is far harder to get a calculation of what the 11% cut in Pillar 2 is likely to mean. For example, is it possible that there could be a REPS 4 payment for 60,000 farmers? I am assuming that the Government does nothing more than co-fund. Is it possible that such provision is in the ballpark? Do we know at this stage the position of what we got in the MFF? I do not presume the Government will over-fund any more than I presume it will not co-fund; I believe the Government will co-fund and no more. What order of magnitude in terms of money will be there for the agri-environment options scheme, installation aid, the farm retirement scheme, the disadvantaged area payments scheme, Leader payments and so on compared to the last time? These details would be useful for an informed debate on the issue.

I have probably used my three minutes but I have two quick, final points. The first relates to small farmers. What is the definition of a small farmer? Is it 5 ft. 3 inches, 5 ft. 4 inches or is it that he gets under a certain amount in Government payments or European payments? What is the level of payment under discussion? The Minister remarked that there was some divergence in this regard. The Minister stated that we know his views on payments greater than €150,000. Will he clarify what they are because I am unsure? I wish to know exactly what the Minister is proposing to do in this regard because, as he stated, it will be at least optional.