Vol. 420 No. 5
12 Mr. Bradford asked the Minister for Agriculture and Food if his attention has been drawn to the fact that the removal of the clawback clause from milk quota leasing arrangements is making it impossible for small and medium sized dairy farmers to lease extra milk quota; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
Following my decision to remove the milk quota clawback arrangements, I immediately announced details of the temporary leasing scheme which has now been put in place. I have increased the amount of quota which a producer can offer to this scheme from the 70 per cent maximum which applied in previous years to 99 per cent.
As there is no transfer of land required under this scheme, and the arrangement is a simple procedure operated by the producer's own co-operative/dairy, this increased level of quota which may be leased along with the increase in the maximum payment from 20p to 25p per gallon should be an attractive option for quota holders who for some reason are not using their entire milk quota in the current year and would otherwise have had to consider leasing their land.
I have also maintained the priority category arrangements for the allocation of the quota offered to this scheme and again, small producers with quotas of less than 30,000 gallons are the first category which is given total priority.
Because of the changes which I have effected to the temporary leasing scheme, additional quota should become available to the priority categories.
For once the reply gives me the information I sought because the Minister said "following my decision to remove the milk quota clawback arrangements..." It had intrigued me as to how this decision came about. I heard very little public demand for it and I am extremely concerned——
Deputy Bradford, this is Question Time.
Do not put him off his stride.
Would the Minister agree that his decision makes it virtually impossible for small and medium sized quota holders to lease milk? I have studied the figures over the past number of years on the clawback scheme. Would the Minister agree that the clawback scheme was extremely effective in assisting smaller producers to lease milk? That advantage has now disappeared completely.
I am very sorry. I want to assist the Deputy in eliciting information but it must be done by way of supplementary questions; speechmaking is out of order.
Would the Minister agree that small and medium sized milk quota holders will have grave difficulty in competing with larger quota holders to lease milk?
First, I would like to give the reason for my decision. The European Commission expressed their intention to delete the clawback because the proposal was based on legal advice. Because of this and because of doubts about the legality of the clawback, it was, therefore, decided to remove our clawback arrangements with effect from 1 April 1992. In relation to the success or otherwise of the scheme, the reserve which the clawback created was small — about 370,000 gallons between December 1987 and March 1992. This would suggest that leases of land quota were generally being arranged between the small quota holders.
Would the Minister agree that the reason the reserve was so small was that the incentive which existed for small quota holders has now ceased? Has any real incentive been put in place?
The clawback was deleted on legal advice. I immediately announced details of the temporary leasing scheme, which should make more milk available. I agree with the Deputy that it is extremely difficult for small quota holders to increase up to a viable quota unless there is sufficient flexibility in the quota scheme. In the Common Agricultural Policy reform proposals last week I succeeded in getting additional flexibility in quota leasing. We new have a situation where quotas are attached to land. We had the ridiculous situation where quotas were allocated to bungalow dwellers who had no interest whatsoever in maintaining a cow or two in their front garden.
There are two Deputies offering. Deputy Ferris and Deputy Farrelly. Brief questions, please.
My supplementary will be very brief because I have discussed this matter with the Minister privately. Does he intend that this liberalisation, which he discussed at the Common Agricultural Policy reform negotiations, concerning the relieving of bureaucracy would also apply to the Mulder quota, which is forbidden to be sold and which could be of assistance to small milk producers if they could get them?
That issue was not part of the proposal adopted. The proposal adopted was for general quotas in legitimate cases of one person or within a family. I am sure many of the Deputies here, including myself, had cases where a parent wanted to divide a quota between two sons and was unable to do so because of the very restrictive regulations which applied. I hope, following the adoption of the additional flexibility in quota leasing, there will be a degree of fairness and latitude to help deserving cases.
The Minister stated that the decision was made because of legal implications. Was the decision made because of legal implications or because the co-operatives did not want to deal with the number of smaller producers who would lease the actual quotas and they wanted to get rid of them?
It was made exclusively because of legal implications.
I hope so.
Let us come to Question No. 14.
