Vol. 416 No. 2
205 Mr. D'Arcy asked the Minister for Agriculture and Food if, in view of the inefficiency of the system currently used by his Department, he will have arrangements made to provide finance to instal the technology appropriate to the amount of money his Department are paying out to farmers under numerous sheep and cattle schemes and thereby ensuring a quicker and more efficient payment system.
The necessary finance has been provided in the 1992 Estimates and arrangements have now been made, subject to the approval of the Government Contracts Committee, to instal enhanced computer systems and equipment this year as part of the Department's information technology plan relating to headage/premium payments and animal movement control.
The current backlog of payments is not, however, a question of technology alone. Present arrears of headage payments, for example, arise mainly from the need to verify and process applications from farmers newly admitted to the disadvantaged areas scheme as a result of the large extension granted by the EC last year. Overtime is being worked in the local offices affected and these arrears are expected to be cleared in the next month.
As regard EC premium payments, considerable inroads into the arrears of payment under the special beef premium scheme have been made in the past week and further progress is expected when the report of the departmental task force comes to hand next week.
