Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The recent budget was a missed opportunity on many fronts. There was no real attempt to address the issue of family farm incomes. The Minister will know from the Teagasc survey earlier this year that, excluding dairy, which was camouflaging great hardship, the average income for farming families is €20,000, which is well below the average wage. There is particular hardship in the sheep and cattle farming sector. There is a real, ongoing failure in this State to address the issue of fair prices for the primary producer. Year in, year out, we hear of "custodians of the land" and all this kind of language, but there is no real, fundamental change. Incomes have continued to be squeezed for years. The measures the Government put into the budget amounted to about €52 million. We need a lot more specifics as to where this is going and the impact it will have. In Sinn Féin's pre-budget submission, we stated that we would spend €62 million in the agriculture sector, but this was without having the information the Minister had, that is, that there was an additional €1 billion that the Government found the night before the budget. Those of us in opposition in a democracy need access to the full facts as to what is available to Government in order to put forward alternatives effectively. Even without that information, however, we had provided more for the agriculture sector. Our focus will continue to be on the sector, particularly small farmers and small family farms.

The EU Common Agricultural Policy, as the Minister knows, comes from a time when people starved after the Second World War. The world and Europe have changed a lot since then, but CAP is still a policy which is needed to protect European and Irish farmers from the rigours of market forces. The proposed reduction in the overall money available for the new CAP goes far beyond the reduction in the British contribution to the EU. I fear that Brexit is being used as an excuse to cut funding for agriculture and environmental investment. A fully funded CAP is vital across the EU on a range of fronts, and in Ireland it is needed to stabilise high-quality food production, protect the environment and sustain the family farm. CAP has been central to the modernisation of Irish farming over the decades. This family farm model of production is a big part of the Irish food story of mainly meat and dairy produced from free-roaming animals fed on our lush green grasses. The new CAP post 2020 needs to enhance the advantage of the Irish family farm model by sustaining small to medium-sized holdings with decent levels of payments.

Pillar 1, where most of the payment is delivered, needs to be got right. The use of old reference years needs to end and a different model needs to be developed. The proposal to front-load payments in Pillar 1 to ranges of hectares could be a major advance for the smaller family farm. We propose that the first 10 ha to 15 ha need to be paid at a high rate of at least €400 per hectare to all farmers and that the next 10 ha to 15 ha be paid at a rate of at least €250 per hectare, with a low rate on the remaining lands. This would deliver a decent base income for farm families and, as most farms are less than 50 ha, the majority would gain by such a system. We need to see the 30 ha to 40 ha farm getting €8,000 to €10,000 in Pillar 1 as a base income that would make farming viable on these types of holdings. I do not have to explain economies of scale in farming to the Minister or anyone else in this Chamber. Larger farms have the advantage, and will continue to have such an advantage, in the type of front-loaded system we have suggested. The proposed upper limit of payments of over €60,000 should be held firm. This is needed to invest in the family farm model. CAP should not be used to create or support industrial farming in Ireland.

Pillar 2 needs to be about actions that work for both food production and the environment in a genuine way. While farming is only one of the many sectors that produce carbon and gases, land use is one of the main ways of sequestering carbon. This brings a responsibility and an opportunity to farmers. Biodiversity enhancement and carbon sequestration through low-impact farming on the uplands have a big role to play in all this, and this needs to be recognised for its role in Pillar 2. There needs to be investment in the organic sector and development of new product offerings. This new CAP needs to address clearly the issues of young farmers' progression and access to schemes which will re-energise the industry. Each and every farm in the country should play its role in carbon sequestration through appropriate broadleaf tree planting, photovoltaic solar, farm building roofs, and other measures as a part of CAP. Each and every farm in the country should play a role in biodiversity enhancement and species protection as these public goods are also very much to the farmer's benefit and long-term sustainability. The efforts on these issues cannot be carried only by those farmers on lands of natural constraint or, in other words, left to the poor relations to resolve.

Some of our farm sectors, such as tillage, sheep and suckling, have become very precarious and depend on CAP payments a great deal. This is mainly about prices being returned to the farmer. The issue of price for product is not simply a matter of EU rules on free markets but needs immediate Government attention. The targets of Food Wise 2025 need to be re-examined in the context of both Brexit and the stresses in the agricultural sector due to recent intensification. Food Wise 2025 needs to be about higher value more than higher volume, and a fair share of that higher value needs to be enjoyed by the primary producer. The basic intention of CAP must be to sustain the greatest number of Irish family farms possible and ensure that farmers are prosperous and the rural economy vibrant. The greater role now being offered to the member state in deciding how the is delivered must not be wasted by short-termism or feeding the already well-fed. We must be mature and practical in providing for the greater good, which is also the individual's long-term good.

I will conclude with a couple of comments on the pressures on the pig sector. I have been talking to a number of pig farmers in my county of Donegal and I cannot stress enough the crisis they are facing with the increase in input prices in terms of feed but also the price decreases in the factories. There is probably education work to be done for consumers in this country to look for the Q mark when they are purchasing products and to understand the need to support Irish producers, especially those in crisis.I know the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine has corresponded with the Minister about this matter recently. I have made representations also to the European Commissioner, Phil Hogan, on this and we are getting analysis rather than solutions. I hope the Minister will indicate some supports that we can give to this sector that is under serious pressure.

I was devastated for one young pig farmer in Donegal who has continued a tradition handed down to him by his father. He does not want to walk away from that because it would break his father's heart. His father has been involved in it for decades. This young farmer could probably make a reasonable living in terms of sheep and cattle farming in which he is also involved. That would probably keep the roof over their heads, but what is dragging them under water is trying to honour the family's legacy. His case in particular struck me as being very unfair. He is a very hard-working fellow who has diversified and tried all sorts of things and, through no fault of his own but because of the current market, he is under serious pressure. We need the Minister to do something for that sector.