Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister did not deal with the specific questions I asked in respect of those three schemes. Perhaps he will furnish me with a written response on that.

The difficulty facing farming is that under the old CAP, Pillar 1 payments amounted to €5.975 billion in Exchequer and EU funding. Under the new CAP, for the entire programme, that figure is exactly the same. In real terms, that is a significant decrease. Under Pillar 2, the funding allocated across all areas under the old CAP was €4.258 billion. Under the new CAP, that figure will be €3.861 billion. In constant terms, there is a decrease in Pillar 2 payments. The proportion relating to co-financing is increasing and will include the €1.5 billion from the so-called carbon tax fund that the Minister committed would not form part of carbon tax. Does the Minister accept that Irish agriculture will be worse off under the next CAP because of the EU budget to which he agreed?

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