Farm waste management grants backlog due to ‘huge delays’ in securing planning
According to Pádraic McCormack, TD, an EU directive stipulates these farmers must take their sheep off the hills between October and January, for a short period in January they put the sheep back on the hills, but they must take them off again between February and March.
They needed facilities on the lowlands, so that they can take their sheep off the mountains for five months of the year.
Farmers who got planning permission in September had to wait another month to get the C2 certificate, and then they could not complete their work, or in some cases even start their work before the deadline.
One such farmer was one of the first applicants for farm waste management scheme grants in 2006.
He made three planning permission applications. “Every time he made an application a reason was given to refuse permission for him to build a slatted shed,” Deputy McCormack told the Oireachtas Committee of Public Accounts last week.
“He corrected the problem and the next reason for refusal was that he was in a natural heritage area. His application was refused a third time on the basis that his land was in a SAC area.”
“They might as well have told him he had to get out of farming because he cannot continue. He does not have the sheds because he could not get planning permission, so he could not complete the work before the end of December.” Situated in the Kylemore area, he had several hundred ewes but had to get out of sheep farming, according to Deputy McCormack.
Several smaller scale farmers applied for exempt developments, but planning authorities took up to a year and a half to deal with these applications.
