Jimmy Deenihan (Kerry North, Fine Gael)

Of the 42,350 applications that have been approved, work has not begun on over 12,000 and it will be very difficult for those projects to be completed at this stage. A number of reasons for delay were put forward by previous speakers. There has been exceptionally heavy rainfall in the past two summers, with which we are all familiar. There is also a shortage of contractors because not all builders specialise in farm buildings and a different type of contractor is involved than the type who would build houses, for example. In a few cases, there have been hold-ups due to difficulties in the determination of An Bord Pleanála appeals.

A further reason for delay was that in a large number of cases throughout the country, animals had to be fed indoors this summer. It was physically impossible for farmers to demolish buildings where they were feeding cattle and they could not carry out infrastructural work in their farmyards. Another important point is that health and safety officers often visit sites where builders are carrying out this work. As the work can be dangerous, contractors are wary of, for example, allowing their workers to work in the rain, which is falling most of the time at present. On several occasions, workers had to stop work and leave the site. The credit squeeze is also a factor which made it very difficult for a number of farmers to get credit for long periods and they had to go to several banks to try to obtain credit.

Based on the EU guidelines for state aid to agriculture and forestry, the Minister should go to the Commission and ask that where there is a legally binding contract between a contractor and a farmer to carry out this work, the deadline should be extended to 30 June, as proposed by Deputy Creed, which is not unreasonable, and if it is possible to extend it until December, so much the better. Deputy Creed's proposal is a generous and responsible one.

The reliance on a legally binding contract is often used as a procedure for the phased termination of tax relief measures. As the Minister knows, we have used this procedure several times, for example, with regard to the phased ending of the hotels scheme and the urban renewal scheme. There is no great difference in this regard. It is state aid in a different way. The procedure can be easily put to the Commission by the Minister and his Department and it would meet the guidelines set down by the EU for state aid. The fact that there would be legal certainty and a contract in place should strengthen the Minister's case with the Commission.

To repeat a point made by Deputy P. J. Sheehan and previous speakers, will the Minister explain to the House why he has not gone to the Commission with this request, if he has not done so? Some 12,000 farmers will not start work before Christmas, which will cause a problem in the future because they will find it very difficult to control their effluent and they will not have storage capacity. Surely the Minister would be making the case for the nitrates directive if he explained to the Commission that the more farmers who have proper holding facilities, the less pollution will result. That is a very sensible argument which anyone would accept.

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