Denis O'Donovan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am disappointed with the amount of time allocated, but that is not the Minister's fault. We do not have an important debate like this on agriculture too often, and since there are not too many in this House who have a keen interest in agriculture, the rest of us should have been given a minimum of ten minutes, but that is the ruling of the House.

I welcome the Minister and I know that his heart is in the right place. I broadly welcome the result of the CAP negotiations. I know the devil is in the detail and some aspects must still be worked out. I also welcome the special provision for island communities. The Minister should be thanked for doing that, because living on an island is difficult enough, but farming on an island is very difficult.

I would like to mention something that is not directly linked to the CAP, but it is an issue that is very prevalent in my area. I was at a public meeting a week ago at which about 400 farmers turned up, and they were deeply concerned about the cuts in the single farm payment. There is a perception in west Cork and south Kerry that this is more prevalent in these counties than in the west of Ireland. I am not talking about a couple of hundred quid, because if that was the case, "they would suck it up and forget about it", as one farmer said to me. However, there are instances where farmers have lost €3,000, €5,000, €7,000 and €8,000. Some of these guys were depending on this money. It is not just one or two here and there; it seems to be widespread. These guys were not being inspected, but the "eye in the sky" or the "man in Mars" who took these photographs has deemed that their forage hectares are less than what they were claiming. In some instances, they never got any prior notice. If there had been a yellow card or a warning, they might have been able to do something. What concerned me at this meeting was the number of farmers who said that when the burning season is open in March - I would not agree with this - they are going to burn all the bushes and natural flora to ensure that if the man in Mars photographs them again, the place will be green rather than be covered, which is anti-greening in my view. It was a very frightening scenario. I have a son involved in the fire brigade service and sometimes in the month of March, most of his time is spent out quenching gorse fires and so on, which I think is a waste of effort. That is a threat which concerns me.

In these instances, one man who lost over €6,000 said he had half the money committed to paying back the credit union, from which he borrowed last year due to a very harsh spring which lasted almost until 1 June. The other half was supposed to pay for foodstuff. When we hear these stories, we know there is something radically wrong. Perhaps the Minister could get the figures per county.

The people who are being hit by these cuts are the severely disadvantaged farmers. Somebody with 70 or 80 acres of good land who is an intensive dairy farmer will not be affected at all. The people who suffer are the guys in the peninsulas and in places like Dunmanway and parts of west Cork who have a lot of cropping rock, natural bushes and firs growing, which we should be trying to preserve anyway as much as we can.

I welcome the minimum of €150 per hectare. The Minister said the maximum is €700 and that the minimum should be an average of €150. I would like to see the gap closed. Perhaps the maximum should be €500 and the minimum should be €250, which I think should be a help. There is new AOS scheme, which the Minister called the GLAS scheme. A big commitment from the Minister's party in the last election was that there was too much red tape attached to these schemes. Farmers and farming organisations are now worried that this new scheme will be laden down with red tape. Some are wondering whether it is worth their while getting into these schemes at all. Many of them would love to see the old REPS come back, or see a REPS 5 introduced.

We hear much talk about the agrifood success, which the Minister built on from our Food Harvest 2020 vision. The likes of Glanbia, Dairygold and the Kerry Group would not exist were it not for the small farmers throughout Ireland. We should never forget that two thirds of the farmers in my constituency that get disadvantaged areas scheme and single farm payments are getting less than €10,000, which I think is a small amount.

I am also concerned about the current price for beef, particularly those who were encouraged to raise bully beef for export. Many farmers who put much effort into that are now lost. My colleague mentioned the suckler cow scheme and the new genomics. If it is correct that the veterinary costs of that will be €50 per animal and the farmer will end up getting €30, then there is something radically wrong. I would prefer the farmer to be getting more money than the vet, with all due respect to vets.