Vol. 495 No. 7
274 Mr. U. Burke asked the Minister for Agriculture and Food the plans, if any, he has to re-print all departmental application forms in order to make them more user friendly and to avoid an applicant being denied benefit under the various schemes due to small technical errors; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21385/98]
It is Department policy to seek to ensure that all application forms are as user-friendly as possible while still providing adequate information to validate the applicant's entitlement to the benefit or service requested. For this purpose all forms are reviewed at regular intervals and my Department is prepared to consider any submissions or suggestions from users which may contribute to facilitating this process.
In the case of the principal income-support schemes the application forms have, in consultation with the main farming organisations, been greatly simplified in recent years and are reviewed on an annual basis. In this process particular emphasis is placed on measures to address areas which caused difficulty during the previous year and on changes to the schemes, if any. The forms now used by the Department are considered to be among the simplest in the EU and this fact was confirmed as recently as last week by senior EU Commission officials to the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Strategic Management Initiative.
