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

To be clear, many farmers have already paid the money. It has been taken out of their milk cheque. They asked for it to be taken out and have paid on a monthly basis. Some farmers, depending on the arrangement between them and the purchaser, will have to pay a lump sum, or a lump sum will have to come out of their milk cheque. Others have been calculating their liability.

We all hate the superlevy. I hate it and the fact that we have to pay it. It is a nonsense that when the objective is to wean countries off the quota, there is actually a date before which there is a full quota and after which there is no quota and in respect of which people are punished by superlevy fines when quotas have actually been removed. It makes no sense and we did our best to change it. We got a majority of countries in the European Union to support us, but we did not have a qualified majority. Some of the bigger countries blocked our proposal. We appealed to the new Commissioner arguing that, although there had to be a superlevy because we could not change it, we should at least examine repayment options that would allow for the making of payments over a three year period. Farmers and co-operatives were anticipating this and had started deducting payments in anticipation of a superlevy fine. Many farmers, therefore, will not have a big lump sum cash flow problem. If they do, we have allowed purchasers, or co-operatives in most cases, to put repayment mechanisms in place. As long as my Department receives the lump sums it needs by each appointed date in the next three years, we can finance it after this.

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