Vol. 478 No. 2
52 Mr. Clohessy asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the extent to which the Charter of Farmers' Rights is being implemented; the areas where the terms of the charter have not been fulfilled; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10760/97]
This week marks the second anniversary of the launch of the Charter of Rights for Farmers. Its publication was an important milestone on the road to the highest standards of customer care in the Department. Since its publication, farmers have explicit commitments in relation to the levels of service they can expect from the Department.
The charter envisaged a programme of substantially improved services to customers across the range of operations conducted by my staff. The measures built in to the charter are focused on two main areas — meeting payment targets for schemes and improving the quality of service provided by local offices.
The payment targets set for 1995 and 1996 have been largely met. Thus, under the 1996 special beef premium scheme and the May 1996 suckler cow scheme, two of the principal schemes, where the charter provides that in most cases the balancing payment will be completed by the end of March and the remainder by the end of June in line with EU requirements, some 92 per cent of applicants have received their balancing payment. The payment schedule for these schemes generally involves an advance payment in the year of application and a second balancing payment the following year.
Full payments under the October 1996 suckler cow premium scheme will commence at the beginning of May 1997 when the six-month retention period applicable to the scheme has expired. This is in accordance with the charter and EU deadlines, as will be the payment of the 1996 extensification premium which is scheduled to commence in early May and be completed in all cases by the end of June. To date some £683 million has been paid to farmers under the various 1996 headage and premia schemes.
This level of timely payment is a considerable achievement given the increased level of checks and controls associated with the land parcel identification system which was introduced in 1996. This system requires the digitisation of all land parcels on maps submitted by farmers; its purpose is to provide my Department with a database whereby land parcels being claimed for area aid purposes can be located, identified, and have area values and land use attributed. Furthermore, the system ensures that parcels of land are not overclaimed by farmers and that the same parcel is not claimed by more than one farmer in a given year. In a minority of cases, problems have arisen in identifying all of the land parcels being claimed. In some cases there are apparent overlaps between parcels being claimed by two or more farmers, and in other cases the area aid application form was not fully completed, which led to difficulties in validating parcels being claimed against maps supplied.
My Department is making every effort to have the outstanding problems sorted out with a view to issuing balancing payments at the earliest opportunity.
