Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 310: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the position regarding farm retirement grants; the number on hand; the number in respect of which a decision has been made in the past 12 months; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43868/09]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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A total of 179 cases were approved for payment in the period 1 November 2008 to 31 October 2009 under the 2007–2013 Early Retirement Scheme. A further 10 applications are currently being processed by my Department and are awaiting additional material requested from the applicants.

The Early Retirement Scheme 2007 was suspended for new applications with effect from 15 October 2008. However it became apparent that there were a certain number of farmers who had their preparations to apply for the Scheme completed or close to completion at that point. Consequently, I took the decision to re-open the Scheme temporarily on 23 September 2009 with limited additional funding with a view to accepting as many as possible of the applications that fell into this category. My Department received a further 175 applications up to the closing date of 30 October 2009. These applications are currently being examined.