Paul Daly (Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the Minister. Most of the issues in his statement have been covered by previous speakers, so I will not go over old ground. I will ask some specific questions and perhaps get a little bit of an insight as to how this whole system is predicted by the Department, and I say this particularly because the system is very predictable. No one is standing over anyone with a big stick saying, "You predicted you would spend X amoung on a scheme and then there were only half the predicted applicants." One cannot hoodwink or force farmers into applying for schemes, so it is only natural that in some cases, possibly all cases, there will be an underspend. None of us has a crystal ball. Conditions change. Farmers with the best intentions might apply for a scheme today and, if their circumstances change, not apply tomorrow. In the Department's thinking, when it comes to us with these headline figures, how are they arrived at? What mechanism, if any, or contingency plan is there within the Department if the scheme does not achieve the predicted number of applicants and the Department can see an underspend coming down the line? What is plan B in such a case? The money has been set to one side, but one sees six months or a year in advance of the end of a scheme that it has not had the expected uptake and the Department will not reach the figure. What happens then with the budgeted money for that scheme?

I would also like to know how many approved TAMS schemes were not carried out now that some of them would have reached their deadline date to have the work completed. They were approved. I do not want the overall number of applicants but the number of applicants who were approved and have now come to their completed deadline and were not taken up on. I know there are a number of such cases. I have some experience on the building side of the matter. This is probably a side issue, but do the Minister and his accountants here from the Department think that the terms and conditions of many of the schemes, TAMS in particular, and the standards required to achieve the grants are over the top? When the applicants, having applied and been approved, then sit down and start doing their costings, they see they may be better off going and doing the project and forgetting about the bloody TAMS grant altogether. They see they can probably achieve as much for less output of their own money and forget about the State money they would have got.

I have already asked how the Department comes up with the headline figures. Deputy Cahill has already mentioned the hen harrier scheme. The Minister is saying €25 million is allocated for the scheme, but if one sits down and does the sums on it, one finds that, if one had 100% take-up from every eligible qualifying stakeholder out there and they all achieved the maximum payment, which is not possible because of the way in which the scheme is set up and the tick-box exercise that must be done, it would come to €17.5 million.

If we had 100% take-up on the maximum payment the figure would come to €17.5 million. Yet, the headline figure is €25 million. Can someone explain that to me? There will be a shortfall in spending on the scheme unless something miraculous happens. I am no mathematician or genius but I can predict that will happen. How are the headline figures generated when schemes are being announced with details on what will be spent on them?