Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)

Single farm payment is not affected by ceilings. I can assure the Deputy that we will do everything we can to ensure we draw down all the available funding under the rural development programme. However, it is a management exercise to do that when we are dealing with ceilings as well as Exchequer targets. This is more difficult for my Department because setting expenditure ceilings as we have under the troika programme is a very blunt tool. It is just about what we spend and does not also take account of what we earn. When all the expenditure, whether it is the co-funding from the Exchequer or from the European Union, counts towards the expenditure ceiling it is a frustrating process. I would prefer just counting the Exchequer contribution towards an expenditure ceiling. This is difficult to manage, but we are doing it in a way that I hope will result in us drawing down all the available funds from Europe.

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