Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 245: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the extent to which payments under REPS have been made up to date in each of the past three years and to date in 2010; the total number of applications received; the total referred for clarification or review on technical or other grounds; the outcome of any such review; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [40861/10]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Farmers are currently in receipt of payments under two REP Schemes, REPS 3 and REPS 4 and there are roughly 31,000 participants in each of the schemes.

REPS 3

Payments under REPS 3 are made in advance, on receipt of the farmer's application for payment on or after the anniversary date of commencement in the scheme. Generally, REPS 3 payments are made within the 8 weeks deadline, as agreed under the Farmers Charter. On the 1st November 2010 there were 2,700 REPS 3 applications pending examination with a view to payment in the Department. A further 10,000 payment applications are expected to be lodged before the end of the year. Every effort will be made to clear as many of these payments as possible before year end.

REPS 4

The EU Regulations governing REPS 4 provide that payments issue in two instalments. The first instalment of 75% may be paid once all administrative checks on all applications, as well as cross-checks against areas declared on Single Payment Scheme applications, have been completed. This process is under way and while my objective is to make all payments for 2010 as soon as possible, the checks are likely to take some weeks to complete. The balancing payment of 25% can issue once all on-the-spot inspections for the year have taken place. The programme of inspections is well advanced at this stage.

As a result of EU audits in early 2008, new checking systems were introduced which led to delays in processing payments for the 2008 scheme year. The additional screening checks which were introduced also raised queries on a large number of plans. As a consequence, the payment of the 75% instalment in respect of 2008 commenced in February, 2009 and continued for some months afterwards. Likewise the 75% payment for the 2009 scheme year commenced in December, 2009 and continued for a number of months. As queries were cleared, payments were made at weekly intervals. There are still some outstanding issues which have held up payment and my officials have made the applicants aware of these and in the majority of cases are awaiting further information from the applicants.