Results 10,841-10,860 of 40,897 for speaker:Simon Coveney

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: I am familiar with the case about which the Deputy is concerned, namely, asking staff to move from Tralee to Killarney-----

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: -----and changing Departments but that difference is not in administration. On this issue, in terms of administration pay and non-pay, we have been making consistent reductions year after year because we were reducing the number of staff. Not too long ago there were more than 4,000 people employed in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine; it is about 3,300 now. In terms of...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: That is a fair question. I have told farmers that I want to hear about it if they are not getting the same level of service as they had previously. For example, we have watched closely the moving of some of the administration staff from Clonakilty into Cork city but there is still desk space for farmers to go into Clonakilty to get advice and what they need from the Department. In truth, I...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: The main portion goes to the dairy and beef investment programmes, in other words, the expansion of large beef and dairy processing facilities. Significant aid was granted, probably before my time in some cases, but we must still pay the bills. Some schemes might receive grant approval for significant amounts, yet they might not proceed with the development or spend the money for a couple...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: The equine infrastructure accounted for approximately €300,000. Capital grant assistance of €1.027 million was provided under the national development programme to assist in the pursuit of improved breeding across the equine sector. The largest chunks of money under this subhead are on the beef and dairy side.

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: Yes. That is a separate fund. This is capital.

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: A number of questions were asked. I cannot speak for other Departments, but our administration costs represent approximately 6.7% of expenditure in our Department, which I confidently suggest is one of the lowest percentages in the Government. Most of our expenditure is on schemes and managing direct payments. The administration cost of running our Department in the past five or six years...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: I think one can safely say the level of expenditure is lower. Total expenditure this year on the EU Presidency has been about €9 million, half of what it was the last time. This had consequences, with all informal ministerial meetings, for example, being held in Dublin, whereas normally they would been held all over the country. The same applies to expenditure on EU Presidency...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: We have to comply with the EU mapping standard, the land parcel identification system, LPIS. We must comply with it by 2019, but Ireland is ahead of most countries in that regard. I have spoken to many other EU agriculture Ministers about this issue and in many countries they feel vulnerable because they have outsourced the system and have no control over it. They are setting targets that...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: The Deputy's questions are current and relevant. A great deal is happening in both areas. The Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Varadkar and I will be launching a safety initiative for the fishing industry in Union Hall next Monday, which the Deputy and all other Members are welcome to attend if they wish. It will involve grant aid, an obligation to training, and the...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: The Deputy will know only too well that from a fisheries point of view we regularly end up in court, including in respect of cases we need to take and where we are taken to court. It is important we win those cases. To do so, we must pay in terms of legal advice. We have a very good legal team within the Department but must also at times seek the opinion of senior counsel. While it...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: We are establishing a new category 4 laboratory in Backweston, which will allow us to test for more diseases than are currently tested for in Ireland. We have international certification to carry out this testing, which is expensive to do. While I understand staff numbers in Backweston will not increase, the facility's capacity for testing, especially for animal diseases, will increase...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: We allocate approximately €10 million per annum to the World Food Programme. While some people may argue that we have enough hunger at home, if we were to decide not to spend this money, it would not be possible to transfer the allocation into other parts of the budget because it forms part of Ireland's aid commitment as a percentage of gross domestic product. This funding has...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: This is a money donation. We also have a new food aid programme in the Africa agrifood fund, which I am pleased to note the Department designed. The new scheme will be very valuable for Irish companies and the development aid programme. Under the programme, the Department and the Department of Foreign Affairs co-sponsor a fund that will assist Irish food companies which agree to establish...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: I thank Deputy Ferris for his comments and his party's support during the horse meat crisis. Sinn Féin was particularly helpful during that difficult period when it could have put the boot in politically and chose not to do so. Its approach was appreciated and I hope it is satisfied with the Department's efforts to keep it abreast of developments throughout the entire saga....

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: The temporary veterinary officer funding allocation relates to meat factories. We rely on a panel of private veterinarians on whom we can call to go in and do work for us in terms of inspections. It is a system that has been in place for a long time. We have reduced the cost of temporary veterinary inspectors by approximately €7 million over the past three or four years. Last year,...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: Last year's Estimate was €940,000 even though we only spent €381,000. This year's Estimate is €860,000. I suspect that unless a problem emerges this year, the actual expenditure figure will be well below €860,000. Hopefully, it will be down to the figure we had last year.

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: I receive a monthly report from the finance staff in my Department on whether we are ahead or behind the Estimate. In some areas, we will be slightly ahead, but in most, we will be slightly behind. As we move to the end of the year, we must review constantly how we are spending money. Sometimes, we move money between Estimates or headings to ensure that we have full spend, which requires...

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: I reckon the tackling of TB is one of the great success stories. The figure in subhead B3 is estimated to reduce from €38 million to €37 million this year. Only a relatively short number of years ago that figure was €58 million. We are down one third in terms of our expenditure on compensation for farmers as a result of TB.

Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2013
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Revised) (2 Jul 2013)

Simon Coveney: I am unsure what figures Deputy Deering is referring to, but addressing TB and brucellosis has been a real success story in the Department, so much so that my British counterpart, the UK Secretary of State, Owen Paterson, spent one and a half days examining our TB programme because the British want to learn from it. The UK is going in the opposite direction and that is a problem for us...