Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)

I am here as long as the Deputy and I was elected by the people, including the farmers, of my constituency. Where other parties considered my constituency to be a commuter belt area, the Fianna Fáil Party knew it was an agricultural area and a very rural constituency. This was not appreciated by any of the other parties in the constituency. I am glad to represent all the people of my constituency and to be elected in the same way as Deputy Connaughton.

My constituents have benefited from the programme and the constituency has benefited from agriculture by some €66 million up to 2005 from 46,000 completed applications. All of these applicants were told at the beginning what the deadline would be. The scheme has been an outstanding success and the officials who negotiated this with the European Commission — as we know from the recent banking guarantee, these negotiations are not easy — did an excellent job. The officials told people from early on what the timing would be. When I first became a candidate for election, the nitrates directive was an issue and this scheme came into being. Coming from a town, I was only beginning to learn about agriculture. I have learned a good deal from my colleague Deputy Johnny Brady and from the Minister, Deputy Smith, for which I am glad.

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