Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

I thank Senator McHugh for raising this issue and his complimentary remarks on the officials in the Department and Teagasc.

Dissemination of information to farmers is accorded a very high priority by the Department. The full range of communication channels are employed to ensure widespread availability of information on the schemes and activities of the Department of Agriculture and Food. Each year, the Department produces a booklet entitled Schemes and Services, which is distributed widely and is also available on the Department's website. This sets out details of the schemes and services operated by the Department along with basic conditions, rates of payment and administrative locations for these schemes. These are available free of charge from headquarters or from local offices of the Department. They are also made available at events involving farmer participation, such as the national ploughing championships.

In addition, the Department publishes details of new schemes in the national press and the dedicated farming press by way of press releases and public notices. An indication of the activity of the Department in this area can be seen in that last year the Department issued 263 press releases and 934 public notices.

The Department also operates campaigns and information meetings on issues of interest to the farming community. For example, following the launch of the mid-term review of the Common Agricultural Policy, the Department organised a series of information meetings throughout the country, which were well received and allowed farmers to make an informed decision in regard to the single payment scheme. Last year, the Minister, Deputy Coughlan, had a meeting on REPS 4 in Donegal and I attended one in Cavan. We covered different areas of the country and the meetings were well-attended, useful and informative for farmers.

Advances in information technology have changed the way in which business is carried out by allowing the Department's customers to interact directly with the Department in order to record and view information on-line over the Internet and by using their mobile phones. The Department is at the forefront in deploying the latest information technology and mobile phone services to facilitate its clients and other clients.

One of the major tasks undertaken by the Department in recent years has been the implementation of the single payment scheme. This huge task was successfully implemented when over €1 billion in single payments issued to 118,500 farmers last December, meeting the target we had set ourselves of making the payments on the first possible date. This was a major undertaking and the outcome, after painstaking preparatory work in establishing individual entitlements, was by any standards a major achievement. It was a great credit to all the officials involved in both local offices and the head offices of the Department. Currently, total payments amount to €1.161 billion, involving 99% of farmers who hold entitlements and applied for the single payment scheme.

In recognition of the significant number of queries farmers had on the new single payment scheme, the Minister decided in September 2005 to establish a dedicated call centre in the Portlaoise office of the Department. This centre, which was staffed by 35 officials on a full-time basis, dealt with up to 2,500 calls per day. In addition, certain actions were taken to assist in the information dissemination, such as information meetings for advisers and the use of generic emails for various type of queries, for example, start date, consolidation, etc.

Subsequently, this call centre was replaced by a system of dedicated lo-call numbers, which provides direct access to both the county sections dealing with the processing of individual single payment scheme applications and those sections dealing with the processing of applications under the inheritance, new entrants, consolidation and force majeure measures of the scheme. Currently, calls to these lo-call numbers are in excess of 5,000 per week. It will be appreciated, therefore, that significant staff resources are occupied in dealing with these enquiries.

However, I am determined that the best possible service will be provided to farmers and, in this regard, will continue to review the allocation of resources on an ongoing basis to ensure that this is achieved. I have asked that the telephone systems available to the single payment unit should be reviewed and upgraded. The level of staff resources made available to the single payment unit for the medium term is also being reviewed to ensure it is capable of operating the scheme efficiently and delivering payments within the appropriate timescales.

As I mentioned, where issues arise during processing of single payment scheme application forms which require to be satisfactorily resolved before payment can issue, correspondence is issued to the persons concerned outlining the nature of the given problem. As prompt written replies to these queries allow such cases to be processed speedily to completion I again urge all farmers to reply quickly to any correspondence received from my Department.

The changeover to the single payment scheme has presented significant challenges to the Department and involves change and re-organisation in the unit in Portlaoise, the 28 local offices, the former regional office in Castlebar and the inspection regime. The introduction of the single payment scheme, falling disease levels and efficiency gains means that staff numbers are currently on a downward trend in the Department.

It is anticipated that there will be a reduction in the number of office staff by 400 on 2005 levels, resulting in lower staff numbers in local offices. This process has already commenced and a significant number of staff have already been deployed to other Departments. The Department will manage the reduction and redeployment of staff numbers while maintaining the coherence, efficiency and effectiveness of the Department and continuing to provide quality services to its clients. I thank Senator McHugh for raising this important issue.