Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)
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Question 45: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the position regarding the Health Check; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [27359/07]

Mary Coughlan (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)
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Reviews of the operation of milk quotas and implementation of single payment scheme due in 2008 will be amalgamated into an overall "Health Check" of the Common Agricultural Policy. A Commission communication in preparation for the Health Check is expected to be tabled towards the end of this month and formal legislative proposals are expected to be published in May 2008. Agreement on the proposals is anticipated for the latter half of 2008 during the French Presidency of the EU. I await with interest the Commission communication due later this month and I will participate actively in the ensuing negotiations. I have urged the Commission to take this opportunity to consider further possibilities for the simplification of the single payment and cross-compliance requirements to reduce the administrative burden on farmers. The Health Check will have a particular focus on dairy aspects, given the Commissioner has intimated that the opportunity will be taken to secure a "soft landing" towards the ending of the quota regime in 2015. I want to ensure, in the negotiating position I adopt, that I have direct access to the broadest views, particularly those of key stakeholders in the industry to assist me in that process. I, therefore, recently established a broadly representative dairy consultative committee, which will advise me on this key aspect of the Health Check.

Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)
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I thank the Minister for her reply. The timelines are as we anticipated and I welcome the establishment of the consultative committee. I refer the Minister to a speech given by Commissioner Fischer Boel in Paris last month. She referred to the Health Check, the strengthening of competitiveness, supporting rural society and so on. It was all very aspirational in its aims. Farmers are worried about the issues of cross-compliance and modulation under the single payment scheme and, particularly, whether the Commission will place upper or lower limits on payments to them under the scheme in the context of the Health Check. They are worried about the nature of cross compliance and the stringent controls under which they are placed. Has the Government defined a clear negotiating position on those issues because farmers have strong views on them?

Mary Coughlan (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy is correct that those are pertinent issues and when the committee is established, a number of them will be considered. That approach will be more than beneficial as we will hear what Members have to say. I have grave concerns about a number of issues, particularly compulsory modulation. Farmers need political stability to proceed in the decoupled era and I expressed that concern to the Commissioner during recent discussions. Our ideas will not be firmed up until we receive the communications but I have laid out the parameters within which I wish to work.

I have to be convinced about the standardisation of the single payment model because the EU has 21 such models and Ireland has developed an historical model, which is more beneficial. It is very unclear what the Commission is seeking regarding thresholds and they may not be necessarily where we want to be in the future under the single payment scheme. The Deputy is correct that I would like changes to be made regarding cross compliance so that there are more flexibilities. Checks and balances are in place under the single payment scheme. While inspections are provided for, strict rules and regulations are applied to the transfer of animals and products entering the food chain. Greater simplification is needed on the cross compliance issue. I have grave concerns about modulation but few member states have such concerns. Many of the new member states are more anxious to move from the first to the second phase into rural development because they do not have a significant investment in the single farm payment scheme and rural development is more important to them. Equally, our colleagues in the UK, who are anxious to implement compulsory modulation, are not prepared to move on many other aspects of the single payment scheme. The Deputy is correct that we do not have firm parameters within which to work but we have set down a number of issues which will be pertinent to the discussions.