Nice €500m grant move to get Yes from farmers

By Fionnan Sheahan, Political Reporter THE Government is to use €500m in grants, payable next month, to sell the Nice Treaty to farmers.

Agriculture Minister Joe Walsh is also seeking to fast-track cereal payments worth about 100 euro million from November to

October in a bid to guarantee a Yes vote from the country's 150,000 farmers.

In an official letter to Fianna Fáil TDs and senators, Mr Walsh urged party members to use the massive grants when selling the referendum door-to-door. In the 40-page document circulated to FF parliamentary party members at the party seminar in Killarney, the minister said he had a special dossier on payments drawn up by department officials for use on the campaign trial.

"The tables on the maximum premium payment rates for suckler cows and special beef premium should be especially useful. As you know, premia payments commence on October 16 each year. I expect that last year's payments, which are outlined by county in this brief, to be significantly higher this year," the covering letter says.

Mr Walsh has applied to EU Agriculture Commissioner Franz Fischler to pay out 80% of the livestock premia. The package is worth 500 million euro and the minister expects a sympathetic hearing, according to the Department of Agriculture.

Normally, only 60% of these grants would be paid in October, but the minister says he is responding to the weather and market difficulties experienced by farmers this year. Combined with the increase in the premia, farmers will receive 60 million euro more than last year. The minister also wants Arable Area Aid, worth about 100 million euro last year, to be paid in October instead of November. He is expecting a response from the commissioner to this request today.

Agriculture industry sources predict the payments, worth thousands of euro to individual farmers, will be fast-tracked by the department once sanctioned.

Despite the minister's reference to the payments and the dates in the context of Nice, the Department of Agriculture denied the timing of the payments was linked to the referendum. The increased payments were sought because of the pressure on farm incomes this year as a result of the adverse weather, the minister's spokesman said.

Speculation mounted yesterday that Taoiseach Bertie Ahern will announce a date for the referendum today at a Cabinet meeting in Donegal. October 18 has emerged as a possibility, but a date in early November is not being ruled out. The importance of the support of the farmers' lobby was highlighted yesterday after a survey found only 16% of people said they fully understood what the Nice Treaty was about and the study found that just over a quarter of people under 24 intended to vote.