Ms Oonagh Duggan:

There has been no evaluation of that. That is something that we have called for. It is very important when we are undertaking measures that there is some way to monitor if it is having a result. Anecdotally, however, we know the wild bird cover in certain areas increased the local passerine, small bird, population and that birds of prey also benefited from the wild bird cover because they would eat the small birds. It helped with the food chain. We would hope that monitoring and evaluation of all these schemes is done so that we know money is being used for the best possible result.