Results 11,501-11,520 of 18,593 for speaker:Michael Creed
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I am grateful for the opportunity to present this request for a technical Supplementary Estimate for 2016 in which I am seeking the committee's approval to use savings on the Department's Vote to fund other desired expenditure. As these proposed transfers and expenditure involve significant changes to the original 2016 voted allocations, I believe it is important to seek the committee's...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I thank the Deputies for their questions. With regard to Deputy Cahill's question about the TB compensation scheme, the savings will be €1.5 million, not €2.5 million. Those savings are as a consequence of the fact that we made provision on the basis of trends and expectations and, fortunately, the incidence of the disease reduced from 3.25% of herds to 3.18%. Though the...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I will respond to a few of the points raised by Deputy McConalogue first. Regarding his persistent line of prosecution that we are underspending on the rural development programme, the reality is that we are behind profile on it. As a result of the fact that GLAS payments are made in December, we will have our spending under GLAS on target by the end of the month. All those awaiting GLAS...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: My understanding is that it is something we anticipate will be spent in 2017. The drawdown just has not materialised in that area.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: No. We have made allocations for research funding available to various institutions. We have appointed successful tenders for the funding but the drawdown has not commenced yet. We are not holding back. The funding is triggered by the approved beneficiaries.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I thank the Deputies for their questions and I shall first respond to Deputy Cahill. We are not talking about savings in the Teagasc budget in terms of the Supplementary Estimate. The savings on the research side do not have anything to do with Teagasc. They are calls that the Department makes for funding it has available for various research projects. Once it makes an allocation or...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: The point I am making is that I am constrained in what I can do by state aid rules. I have exploited the latitude I have under them by providing for this loan scheme. The €14 million provided under it has not gone exclusively to the tillage sector. It is available to the tillage, mushroom and livestock sectors.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I have heard this. There are no proposals from the French authorities or the Commission that we have not supported, but we have not seen any prospect of a Commission rescue package for the tillage sector emerging at European Council level. I ask the Deputy to believe me what I say we would be in the vanguard if such a package were to be made available. It has been suggested we are not...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: As I said, €11.1 million is available to the livestock sector, while €4 million has been ringfenced for the non-livestock sector. Approximately €25 million, comprising the €11.1 million I have mentioned and the €13 million-----
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: Some €4 million has been ringfenced for the non-livestock sector. Approximately €10 million is flexible, depending on the take-up.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: Deputy Charlie McConalogue asked about the overall picture within the Department. What we are reallocating is current expenditure in 2016. As we have flagged previously, there will be an underspend in other areas of capital budgets such as TAMS. We issued TAMS approvals and farmers applied in good faith. This has been a particularly difficult year for those involved in some of the...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I assure the Deputy that it is not.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: When I received submissions from farm organisations in advance of the budget, they asked for an affordable finance product. To be fair, all of them have raised with me the specific issue in the tillage sector. Unfortunately, I am constrained on two fronts. First, I do not have an endless amount of resources because I used what scope I had to invest in the loan fund. Second, I am legally...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I will try again to explain this. As a general rule, there is a prohibition in Europe on a state bailing out any particular sector or giving it an advantage relative to its other competitors across the EU. Whether it is dairy, beef or tillage, we could not, even if we had the resources, give a specific capital injection or assistance because it would be deemed illegal under current EU...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: We cannot provide it twice.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: I took my decision based on the engagement I had at the stakeholders' forum after the harvest and what the ask was. In terms of the limited resources we have, we have put some €14 million into the loan fund. I based it on the basis that this was one of the asks. I appreciate that there were a whole host of things, but I do not have an endless supply of funds, so I availed of what...
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: As the Deputy is aware, however, we have prepared our budget for 2017 and brought forward that commitment which allows us to do other things. For example, one of the new initiatives of budget 2017 is a €25 million sheep scheme.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: We had indications that we would have underspend in certain areas. We did not know the scale of it. Where we had underspend, we tried to meet some of the demand for 2017 by bringing forward payments.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: Deputy McConalogue is ignoring the constraints I am under legally in terms of state aid rules.
- Select Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Estimates for Public Services 2016
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Supplementary) (6 Dec 2016) Michael Creed: The Deputy is.