Mr. Eddie Punch:

I will try to address what Deputy Carthy was getting at and the question of whether this is being fully funded to the greatest extent possible. The issue is that we were promised that there would be €150 million of carbon tax money, along with the State doing what it is required to do under the co-financing rules to the greatest extent possible and on top of the EU money. There are three sources of funding for CAP.

We did a CAP plan proposal in the ICSA, which we costed. Using our figures we were able to account for a €10,000 average agri-environment scheme. We were able to find money for a beef finisher programme and we were able to do all of the other things as well. There is a concern in our mind that there are some serious questions about how this is being costed. It is difficult to do that analysis yet because of a couple of variables. We do not know how many people qualify for the eco scheme, although we think a lot do. We do not know how many people for ACRES and how much they will draw down under it. We do not know how many people will go into the suckler scheme and how many cows that is in respect of. There is the sheep welfare scheme as well. Both of those schemes are challenged by people getting out of them.

There is a sense that the Department, particularly with the rush to close down ACRES as quickly as possible, is playing around with the allocation of funds. The pillar 2 schemes are multi-annual in nature, with multi-annual funding allocations. As a result, it is hard, at this early stage, to say whether this is being funded to the extent we were promised it would.