Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

No. Deputy Creed is misrepresenting the situation again. He is obviously not prepared to listen and hear the facts. We had to reallocate some expenditure. I decided reluctantly to reduce the expenditure on the disadvantaged areas scheme. I have already outlined that the vast majority of people in the disadvantaged areas scheme will not have their payment affected. It is people with hectarage above 34 hectares who will be affected. Everybody will be paid up to the rate of 34 hectares.

I want to give the Deputy some facts. The total area that will not be payable under the new limit is 204,000 hectares in the cases of more severely and less severely disadvantaged lands, while the area reduced in the case of mountain type grazing is 102 hectares. There was some misrepresentation that that latter category with the biggest hectarage would be affected. That is not correct.

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