Results 12,661-12,680 of 28,255 for speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: Let us suppose it is a notifiable action to restore the land, and any land reclamation tends to be a notifiable action. Let us further suppose a farmer writes to NPWS to ask permission to carry out this work. I take it that until NPWS replies - and if that is ten or 20 years that is tough luck - the State cannot have double jeopardy for the farmer and the farmer is covered and can keep...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: I thank the witnesses for the detail they have given us. The LPIS process is causing huge grief. The major problem with the 2013 maps is that many of the features being picked out involve 0.01 ha or 0.02 ha. Some of it is a matter of opinion with regard to whether it is scrub with no grass growing on it and therefore not forage. Many farmers dispute this. The Department may state that an...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: I am a little confused. Mr. Evans said that 70% of farmers have no problems, that means 30% of farmers have an issue. He then indicated that 2,500 farmers approximately were informed of the application deductions for the period from 2009 to 2012. I wish to establish whether it runs from 2008 to 2012 or from 2009 to 2012? Second, does that mean that the other 30,000 farmers are through the...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: There are some 30,000 farmers who could potentially get a letter once the Commission auditors leave numbers telling them there is retrospection.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: I know that, but there are some 30,000 farmers in the pool. Is that not correct?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: How did Mr. Evans arrive at that figure?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: That is the nub of the problem. It is fine that the Department wrote these letters to people, but most farmers thought they had made enough adjustments for the features, as Mr. Evans called them. Rocks are very hard to measure, scrub is always going to be a point of argument and other features are hard to measure when one gets down to the micro level of these maps. A farmer does not have a...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: Yes; we want to be very accurate. I presume that there are a few more digits after that.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: Exactly. We could probably add a few more digits. It could be like pi and be without end. If we deem 1 hectare to be 2.471 acres, then 0.1 hectares equals 0.24 of an acre. That is not an awful lot of land for somebody to measure accurately, particularly when talking about rocks and things. Another problem that I find annoying, and which many farmers find awful strange, is to do with...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: No, only if they are in REPS 4.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: If I decided in 2018 to record all of my 20 hectares, for example, on the application, with only ten acres recorded as eligible, then I could double my payments on the ten acres, yet still be on the right side of things forever. Perhaps that is an exaggeration. Let us say I recorded 19 of the 20 hectares and stacked it. Therefore, the only difficulty would be that one could not go up or...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: One will not go up as much or one will not come down as much.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: Under the EU regulations the Commission has a right to impose a flat rate correction of 2%, 5% or 10%. If one is 99.9% accurate can the Commission still impose a fine of 2%?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: To date, and cumulatively, 132,000 have been done. Let us say every appeal fails. What percent is the overclaim out of the total amount of land involved?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: What does that percentage represent in hectares?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: Is that 44,000 hectares?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: That amounts to €250 per hectare.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: For the State, it seems to me to be €1 million.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: It will cost €1 million to sort out the fact that 44,000 hectares have been overclaimed. That means farmers have been paid for 44,000 hectares they should not have been paid for. Is that right?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Coastal Farm Holdings: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (20 Feb 2014)
Éamon Ó Cuív: I am not saying that. I am referring to the State or Ireland Inc.