Overclaiming issue is a mess
That seems to be the attitude of Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney to the ineligible land threat hanging over many farmers.
He says his department must assess every farm in the country, to see if there has been an overclaim of payments (on ineligible land) in the past four years, and Ireland must give back any overclaimed money to the EU.
The minister says some member states faced with the same problem said they could not deal with the detail, because it is too big a job. In those countries, the European Commission assessed the overclaims, and multiplied them by a “considerable” figure to arrive at a disallowance or fine.
Mr Coveney believes Ireland is one of the few countries with the capacity to assess every land parcel accurately to see if there is an over-claim. So that is what he is doing, and he says the only farmers who will be asked to repay money are those who overclaimed — whether they knew it or not.
It will be a major test for his staff, but an even bigger and tougher test for the farmers who depend so heavily on the €1.2bn per year single farm payment, and the other payment schemes linked to eligible land.
They include 400 farmers who have been told they over-claimed by more than 20%, for which the penalty includes no payment for a year of their share of the €1.2bn.
But many have been accused of lesser overclaims. And many of these are small scale farmers who can least afford penalties.
Undoubtedly, many of them are victims of the very bureaucracy now tasked to sort out their problems, and of the mapping system which has cost the Department of Agriculture multi-millions of euro to set up and maintain.
Each year, a farmer must draw a red line on a map around areas on their holdings that are no longer agricultural land, such as a new farm road, extended yard or shed, spreading scrub — or wet areas which became overgrown during recent years which were too wet for the farmer to do normal land maintenance.
Farmers face penalties if they make a mistake of greater than one tenth of a hectare (quarter of an acre). However, some farmers say they are now being accused of overclaiming even smaller areas.
Over the years, farmers receive re-digitised maps from the Department of Agriculture, with small corrections. Some who presumed these were correct, because they came from the department, are now accused of overclaims based on these maps.
Some of those accused had their maps passed previously in inspections as part of REPS and other schemes, but have fallen foul of the clampdown in the past four years — triggered by more accurate satellite imagery available to the European Commission, which newly showed up apparent payment overclaims among the 950,000 plots which the Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS) divides Irish farmland into.
Overclaim penalties have come out of the blue for farmers. They didn’t read the proverbial bureaucratic small print (tiny X01, X02 and X03 symbols on maps show land deemed ineligible, and disallowance amounts are in very small print).
As for the financial implications of disallowances, the explanation is typically bureaucratic. Where the overclaim is deemed less than 3%, or two hectares, payment is reduced to reflect the eligible area reduction. Where the overclaim is more than 3%, but less than 20%, payment is based on the new eligible area, reduced by twice the difference between the area determined and the area claimed (or entitlements held, if lower).
Where the difference is more than 20%, but less than 50%, there is no payment for a scheme year.
Mr Coveney says his staff will be as helpful as they can in getting farmers under the 20% or 3% threshold. Where an overclaim of more than 20% is alleged, department staff will deal individually with the 400 or so farmers in question, and will reduce the overclaim below 20%, if it is possible, for example by “netting off” any over-claims or under-claims among the farmer’s land parcels.
The minister says that where a claim has been approved on the basis of a physical inspection on a farm, there will not be any retrospective penalty.
Coveney’s objective is to get to the start of 2015 ready for a new CAP round. with accurate maps. and money being drawn down on eligible land.
That’s a tall order.
The current industrial action by over 600 Department of Agriculture technical staff is just one of the obstacles which could bog down what is already a bureaucratic mess.
The mess is spreading well beyond the Department of Agriculture, with many farmers seemingly choosing to go to the Ombudsman, either in addition to or instead of the two appeals routes available in Coveney’s department.
