2026-01-29

5. Deputy Martin Kenny asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will ensure that increased funding of the Common Agricultural Policy is a key objective during Ireland's Presidency of the EU; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6780/26]

The Minister has known me long enough to know that I do not engage in soundbites. I engage in genuine debate. I hope we have respect for each other in that context. The Common Agricultural Policy, CAP, is the most key element in farmers' income because it is sustainable and long-term and they know it is there. However, there is talk of cutting it by 20% to 22%. That equates to a shortfall of about €2.4 billion. What measures will be taken to restore that level of funding for farmers in the forthcoming CAP?

I am delighted to have the opportunity to discuss a matter of real substance and of real consequence for farmers for this year and from 2028 to 2034. The decisions we make this year and going into next year will be absolutely critical. I look forward to engaging with the Deputy and colleagues on the Oireachtas joint committee and to working in the very collaborative way we have done for the past year. Members on all sides of this House have delivered. While not everyone is of the same perspective regarding the approach I have taken, we have largely delivered for our agriculture sector on major matters like TB reforms and fixing issues with ACRES. I have had support from around the House in doing those things. I have also been held to account, which is only right. I have also had support on the nitrates derogation and the steps I took to defend farmers' interests by opposing the Mercosur deal. Farming is in a better place because of the work we have done together over the last year. Nowhere will that be more important than in the context of the CAP. We will have to make loads of small decisions. Last week, we spent three and half hours in a committee meeting discussing a range of different measures and how this will turn out. At the heart of the question are the decisions that are to be made on the multi-annual financial framework, MFF, which is the overall budget for Europe. As the Deputy outlined, we do not have a sufficient amount of money ring-fenced for the CAP. It is not that the decisions we make will be academic, but they will absolutely be impacted by how big a slice of the cake the agriculture sector gets. If the CAP gets less, that will be a major issue. I have raised this consistently at every meeting of the AGRIFISH Council. Commissioner Hansen wants the same thing as us. He wants more funding in that area. I said last summer that the 80% that has been ring-fenced is a starting point we can build on. There is also a proposal regarding a national regional partnership plans structure. As I again raised in Brussels last Monday, some of the constraints within that structure are concerning. The percentage for social cohesion could impact our ability to use that mechanism with absolute flexibility. There is also the question of how the rural clause 10% will be used in the end. These are key decisions that have not yet been made. With regard to the overall amount of money, we need a CAP that is sufficiently funded.

There was a meeting of the EU's AGRIFISH Council this week. Was progress made on additional funding at that meeting? What is happening? Farmers and people in the sector want to know where matters stand and what progress has been made. I appreciate that the Minister is saying that everything possible is being done and that he is trying to talk to people and so on but we need information and communication around this issue. Without that, farmers will naturally feel they are not being sufficiently looked after. There is also talk of scrapping entitlements. Many farmers, particularly young farmers, had to spend a lot of money to buy entitlements. How is that going to work out? That is key for farmers, particularly young farmers who are not seeing a return on big investments they have put in. Is the Minister in favour of scrapping entitlements? Does he want to see a one-size-fits-all payment across all hectares? What are we looking at in the future? We need information in respect of all of this.

The overall level of funding will obviously be dictated by the negotiations on the MFF by the Heads of State and Government. The Departments of Finance and foreign affairs are the lead Departments in these negotiations, in consultation with the Department of the Taoiseach. Ireland's position is very clear. We cannot support a weakening of the CAP budget. Our priority in the negotiations is to secure an adequate overall budget and a CAP that is simpler, fairer and sufficiently flexible to respond to economic, social and environmental needs. I will continue to engage actively with the Commission, the European Parliament and other member states to ensure Ireland's interests are fully reflected as discussions progress. On the Deputy's specific point about entitlements, these are key decisions that we will have to make but, right now, there is no provision for entitlements. This is not a major issue for most member states because most of them have fully flattened and converged payments, as discussed at Cabinet last week. We have to make decisions on what to fight for. If we did get entitlements back as part of our element of flexibility, it would probably be conditional on further movement on convergence. These are the types of negotiations and discussions we need to continue to have. We will be able to make decisions in some areas earlier but others will take a bit more time.

I appreciate that. The Minister also mentioned simplification. Most farmers who have been hearing about simplification for the past 40 years would almost wish that somebody would talk about complication, because it seems to be the opposite that always happens. Every time schemes are brought out, we are told there will be simplification but, in actual fact, it means more paperwork, more red tape and more measures to comply with. We need to start doing what we say. If things are to be simpler and easier for farmers to comply with, it needs to be like that. ACRES is an example. The Minister might say that has been ironed out. I accept that there has certainly been progress in his term as Minister. However, when that scheme was brought out, it was such a mess that the Department did not know how to administer it at first. That again erodes farmers' confidence in the whole system. That is what I am getting at here. All of this is about farmers' confidence in the system. They need to know that, when they are set a particular objective, they will be rewarded when they attain it. That is not how they feel. They are afraid the next CAP will be very much the same.

I share the Deputy's concerns about simplification. Historically, we have seen complication. You see this with measures coming forward from Brussels, particularly from directorates general other than DG AGRI. We have the carbon border adjustment mechanism, CBAM, and we had the EU deforestation regulation. Those proposals came from a good place but their practical impact on farming and so on had not been fully considered. We then had to unpick some of those measures. We discussed CBAM for a considerable length of time on Monday. The Presidency of the EU in the second half of his year, when I will chair the AGRIFISH Council, which comprises me and the 26 other ministers for agriculture, gives us a huge opportunity to shape discussions. I am on record as having stated clearly before that I really do want to deliver simplification. If our budget is going to be constrained, or even if we get it up to 100%, the purchasing power of those funds in 2028 and 2029 will be very different from what it was in 2021. That is a challenge for us. Ultimately, simplification means fewer schemes. It means the greatest amount of money possible is directed at farmers and that it is not tied up in bureaucratic schemes. The Deputy mentioned ACRES. I am very proud of the work my Department and I did to address those issues. It is operating like a perfectly normal scheme now, with more than 96% of farmers paid. On the record of the House, just to clarify, almost €750 million has been paid to farmers since 2023 through this environmental scheme. This is a serious success in supporting our farmers in the work they do.