Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It will come up in the next one. I will answer it if I can. I answered a question earlier about when the Department had to introduce mandatory online form filling. Many people made the point that the average age of our farmers is 57 or higher. We have so many farmers in their 70s trying to navigate an IT system. There was huge concern that we would not be able to manage that. People underestimated the resilience and capabilities of farmers in conjunction with their advisers and family members. Great credit is also due to the officials in the Department.

In the response to an earlier question on the system, I outlined that it appeared certain farmers had not filled out the area of natural constraint, ANC, application properly. The Department went to some lengths to assist them. We wrote to them, we had pop-ups on-screen to say that the applicant was potentially making a mistake, and we also rang farmers. Following those phone calls, an extra 150 farmers amended their single farm payment application for that year to make sure they had it right. With that there are opportunities in the online system. Farmers have proven themselves adept at it. The recording of information in the system, and us being able to identify in real time where farmers are at, is a help in some ways.

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