Ireland, England and Wales to dodge land fines
The Scottish Government warned farmers in September they faced losing up to four years of subsidies if any mistakes were found in the maps they used to claim payments. More than 2,000 farmers have since corrected maps.
However, MEP George Lyon has warned the sudden clampdown by the Scottish Government on ineligible land claims may be too late, and said a big EU fine may be on the way in Scotland after farmers claimed subsidies on ineligible land such as watercourses, ponds, roads, or areas covered with scree, rocks, gorse, bracken, woods, hard standing, yards, houses and buildings.
Northern Ireland’s fine for the same problem may be as high as £111 million. But Lyon said England, Wales and Ireland had all excluded land covered by bracken and gorse from subsidy claims since 2006, and they have been given a clean bill of health by the EU’s auditors.
He queried whether the Government or farmers would have to pay the likely fines in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Scottish farmers leader James Withers said Scotland and Europe’s farmers remained trapped in a bureaucratic nightmare.
“The level of fear attached to a business failing a farm inspection and subsequently losing some or all of its support payments due to the resultant penalties is a totally unacceptable state of affairs.”
In Ireland, according to Agriculture Minister Brendan Smith, the vast majority of farmers have been making sufficient deductions from their EU payment claims to take account of ineligible areas. However, in many cases, there was no mapping evidence supporting these deductions.
As a result, he urged all farmers earlier this year to map out ineligible areas, and some payments have been delayed while these maps are digitised. The Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS) underpins area-based EU payments and is worth more than €1.8 billion annually in Ireland.
It is crucial that the LPIS accurately reflects the true position on the ground, given the audit scrutiny that this scheme attracts not just in Ireland but in all member states, said Mr Smith.
