Paul Connaughton (Galway East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for the response. The last line is the bit I am most concerned about, which I think should be reconsidered, is where it states they are going ahead with this by 31 May and that is it.

No one is hiding anything here. The Department is well aware of what each farmer receives. The EU auditors are over here every year making sure every cent of taxpayers' money is spent properly and, if it was not being spent properly, we would know about it and the whole of Europe would know about it. I am not sure why we are so hell bent on this extra step forward all of the time.

I will always bring it back to the local. I apologise for being parochial but I cannot understand, particularly for those in very rural constituencies who may live a number of miles away from their neighbours, why we have to publish the name, address and amount of money they are about to receive and then we announce when they receive it. If a gang of criminals wants to target a house or farm, we effectively tell them when the money is going to arrive. I really cannot understand this and the matter should be re-examined.

Again, I want to state publicly that this is not about accountability or wanting to prevent transparency. We have that already. The Department should just publish the county and name, for example - County Galway, Paul Connaughton and the number. That does not mean much to anybody but people will know what I received. Why we have to give the address and other details is really beyond me. In some parts of our society, such as health or education, we are very strict on data protection law, and correctly so. All of a sudden, for farming, data protection does not seem to be talked about due to this over-zealousness of the European Union. These proposals were knocked back a few years ago and here they come again. I request that the Minister, Deputy Coveney, go back to the Commission and say we have some concerns. He should ask that we address them and arrive at a fair and feasible solution where we give the Commission the transparency it wants while protecting the identity and addresses of farmers.

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