Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputies opposite for bringing this motion before the House as it gives us an opportunity, which is always welcome from my perspective, to debate the Government's approach to agriculture.

The Fianna Fáil motion is based on Article 39 of the Lisbon treaty. It is important for people to understand what that states because the Deputies opposite only picked out a small portion of that article. It states:

1. The objectives of the common agricultural policy shall be:

(a) to increase agricultural productivity by promoting technical progress and by ensuring the rational development of agricultural production and the optimum utilisation of the factors of production, in particular labour;

(b) thus to ensure a fair standard of living for the agricultural community, in particular by increasing the individual earnings of persons engaged in agriculture;

(c) to stabilise markets;

(d) to assure the availability of supplies;

(e) to ensure that supplies reach consumers at reasonable prices.

and so on.

In other words, this is about providing a modern food-production system across the European Union through family farms to ensure we have a competitive market operating here so that we can see an industry grow and ensure farmers get a fair return for what they produce. That is exactly what we have tried to achieve and, in my view, have achieved through the negotiations over the newest Common Agricultural Policy.

It is important to remind the House that when the Government took office the predictions were that the CAP would reduce its funding by 30%.

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