Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

195. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the extent to which he expects to be in a position to offer support to Ulster farming and fishing families in the aftermath of Brexit and in the context of a borderless island of Ireland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18515/18]

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The Irish Government wants the EU-UK negotiations to work in order to ensure that a hard border on the island of Ireland can be avoided, while also ensuring that we have as close as possible a trading relationship with the UK in the future. Regulatory alignment in relation to sanitary and phytosanitary issues will be vitally important in this regard and that is why the fulfilment of the commitment on regulatory alignment by the UK Government in the Joint Report of last December is so important

While I cannot provide direct support to the farming and fishing families of Northern Ireland I am confident that a borderless Ireland, with regulatory alignment, is in the best interests of all such families.

My Department will continue to support farming and fishing families in this State by means of the programmes set out in the current CAP and CFP regimes and through any new EU backed support Schemes that may come into force post 2020 and 2022 respectively.

The Government remains very focused on supporting farming and fishing families and the whole agri-food industry through the challenges ahead, whether they are based in Donegal, Cavan and Monaghan or in any other part of the country.