Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for coming to the committee so promptly following our invitation. I appreciate that.

I will focus on the agri-climate rural environment scheme, ACRES. There are around 6,000 farmers still not paid under the scheme, which represents around 15% of all applicants. We are halfway through year 3 of a five-year ACRES. The lack of payments coming through is seriously eroding farmer confidence in the scheme. I acknowledge almost €500 million has been paid out - that is to be welcomed - but there are serious challenges in drawing down the funding. I note the Department spent €65 million on IT contractors in 2023 and 2024 and that figure does not include internal spending on IT. There are massive issues around farmers with cash crop commonages receiving payment. Are we getting value for money for that €65 million? What was it spent on? I have spoken to an awful lot of farmers recently who changed their farming structure to a registered farm partnership or company and they continue to meet payment issues across all the schemes due to IT functionality issues.