Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

I am also concerned with the delay in getting out a REPS payment for which the funding has been provided and is in place. Almost 11,000 applications were submitted until 15 May 2008, which were related to 2007. Of the 12,292 REPS 4 applications in 2008, only 11% passed all the administrative checks. We went to Europe towards the end of the year and we sought permission from the European Commission to continue the previous system whereby advance payments would be issued. The European Commission would not allow us to do so. I do not agree with the statements made by some private planners and by some people in Teagasc that it is the fault of the Department.

There are obvious errors in these applications. There are decimal points in the wrong place and there are missing documents——

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