Tax-cheat farmers to get funds without cert

SOME 583 tax-cheating farmers will get the new EU Single Farm Payment next December - without producing a tax clearance certificate, the Department of Agriculture has confirmed.

Farmers are the country’s biggest tax cheats and have paid over €45 million in default payments to the Revenue Commissioners over a three-year period, according to an Irish Examiner analysis of the official figures.

This was an average payment of €77,857 for each tax-defaulting farmer from March 2002 to March 2005.