Mr. Aidan O'Driscoll:

There were a series of audits. The Department is subject to EU audits all of the time. I do not wish to in any way minimise the importance of the disallowance because it is a very large disallowance and we are unhappy that we incurred it but this matter needs to be looked at in the context of the overall scale of the Department's payments and the size of disallowances in other member states. The disallowances in other member states that are much larger than in our case are in member states that have excellent records. They are not in member states in respect of which one might take the view that that is to be expected. Why did it arise? The primary reason is that when the Commission came here on various visits it identified issues on the ground. When the Commission visits in the context of an audit it looks at a sample of files. It looks particularly at a sample of cases in respect of which we have conducted inspections. They also visit a selection of farms. They then move randomly from the farms selected into neighbouring farms, for example, or other farms in the same areas. The Commission makes its own judgment on whether land is eligible or not.