Michael Fitzmaurice criticises habitat designations and entitlements

This environmental stuff, you'd think it was voluntary, but it's not voluntary. We've been imposed on us since the 80s. We were destocked back in the 80s on the hills. We had our land designated without any consultation whatsoever, and it was forced upon us, and no compensation whatsoever for the designations. And we see the efforts now, we've witnessed it ourselves, the efforts our department and our public representatives made in relation to protecting the Nathus Directive. There's an amount of resources and effort that's put into doing that to protect that aspect of the farming, and we're absolutely totally ignored. 25 years living with designations and not a cent of compensation for that. I can't say I would post. The Milken people are wondering about getting 90,000 euros per grant to store somebody else's slurry. I can't drive a poster, I can't drive him at a spade on my own land without permission from the National Parks and Wildlife Service. So we've been very badly treated in the previous CAP, and I want to answer Michael Pittsburgh's questions as well. He has put a couple of good questions. In relation to the entitlements, Michael, absolutely they should be abolished immediately. They were the most scandalous thing that ever was introduced in this country. 40% of the entitlements that had been leased out were held by investors. There weren't farmers at all. Lying at home in their beds. Are they not in property rights? This is the question. Get up with the property rights we're looking. Yeah, but I'm asking the question in your view, because we deal, every one of us is public reps. We deal with changeover if someone passes away, and every one of us has to deal with that. If you haven't said, I bequeth everything I own, you could give the land, and then it comes to entitlements, and then if you haven't written into the will, I bequeth either everything I own or I bequeth the entitlements, then they're not given to go back to the National Reserve. And the question I'm asking all of you, or any of you that wants to, you'll come in there, are they a property right? Because will there be trouble getting rid of a property right? That's my question. They're very similar to me, if you like, Michael. Just give Tommy one second. But the question I'd like to answer to, whether they're property right or not, it has to be removed. Because a young fellow is starting out buying a bit of land, maybe for the first time in his life he's able to buy a bit of land, and he has to pay somebody that's lying at home for the privilege to farm that land. That entitlement has to go to the man that's working the land, not the investor that's lying at home in bed. Right. Go on, John. Yeah, no, look, big cutters were a property right as well, Michael. Go through the rest of my questions as well. They were abolished in 2015. So entitlements are no different. If they're abolished, they're abolished. Okay. You know, I think that's the... I think Dennis wants to cover the habitat space. Yeah. Yeah, like, I suppose, Michael, to go back to where to cut, like, I mean, there's a proposal there to cut anybody earning over 100,000 of entitlements. We're fully in support of that. But when you want to start a cut of 20,000, it's a very low base to start cutting people's entitlements. There's not too many people working in this house for less than 20,000 or anywhere near it. So, I mean, how do you expect people to survive? I agree totally with you. The habitat structure is being used. It's the thin end of a wedge. And I don't think we're looking at the consequences. We have a European Commission that are afraid of their life that they're going to be taken to court again, like they were in the Dutch case, that the Dutch case was taken by an NGO. But, like, we have a system in this country, like, and hopefully it's going to be abolished with what's been announced today, that anybody can take a court case and the exchequer picks up the bill once it's on environmental grounds. And it's been completely abused. And we have people costing the taxpayer millions and millions and millions. Like, we have a society that elects people put in public representatives to take consideration of a load of factors before they decide whether something should go ahead or not. My question, though, is if the Habitats Directive has to be, say, I know the Barrow in the Orange, I'm reading stuff that's coming through there about fertilizer that has to come down, usage as well, I don't know. What my question is, just said the derogation farmers at the moment, we have to do, basically, a screening out or whatever of different areas over three years. Are we opening the door, if we let this in now, are we opening the door that the fellow or the person on 100 or 80 units or whatever is going to be brought into the same niche because the people that love going to court will go into court and DCJ, I call it a kangaroo court because large is the go with everything that's not normal. And will we end up that farmers will be, I saw the Habitats Directive what had done to the designated areas. I was in the, I'm in these areas. Tommy is 100% right in what he's saying about that they got nothing, they were left behind. And what I'm saying is, if we let this in now, are we just opening the door for 10 years down the road, five years down the road, that we are in serious, serious bother thing? But it's already signed into law. That's the point we have. Like, I mean, it was Michael D. Higgins that signed it into law back in 1998, and it's there. The National Parks and Wildlife haven't enforced it for the last 25 years. Now it's coming up because it's been led in by the thin end of the wedge under derogation. But it's really there under the water frame-up directive, not derogation. But is it Europe that's pushing this? Europe are pushing it, like, yeah. I think, Michael, as well, we have the director, we have the Habitats Directive, we have the Borders Directive, but they came in in the early 1990s. We were the first in Ferdinand Lane, those bog men, when there were flying helicopters over us. Everyone else thought, we didn't matter, but everyone knows that now around Ireland what matters. The way those directors have been interpreted is not what they were intended. I'm quite honest, and I think we're going to have to review, I think Europe is going to have to look at those directives again. To be quite honest. But it really is going to be the thin end of the wedge because, I mean, when you allow them in, if somebody wants to build a house, is that going to be deemed a project eventually, and will somebody end up having to do an appropriate assessment for the smallest? It's not, will they? In my area at the moment, because of designation, you have to do a screening out appropriate assessment. In any place near us, you have to do all that. It's going to end up everywhere, though. Ports, airports, every single thing now is blocked. Can the rest of the questions I was on to you both if you can answer them? Owen, yeah. Mike, did you ask me a question about the diagram in our submission? Yeah. So that's taken straight from the Commission's websites. And one of the points I've made in our submission is getting accurate information that you can read and study and at least challenge if you find stuff objectionable in it. So this is information. It's the table that shows $865 billion budget. The small portion in there, the green little box, is the $290 odd billion for ring fencing for cap income support. The bigger number is the national and regional partnership plans, $453 billion. So what's available out of that fund that can be directed towards primary producers or farmers outside of the ring-fenced income support? And I think there should be a portion of that for sure. The next question that comes on from that $290 odd billion is the $8.1 billion that's on the table for Ireland. Again, I've sent the links of all this information from the EU websites. That's only something like 2%. There is an exercise about external convergence and I'm going to ask through the chair, what is Ireland doing about external convergence to increase our share of that pool? We've got $8.1 target at the moment based on the current split, but why is the split can be challenged and are we challenging that split for the 2027 to 2034 number? And that's called external convergence. So we need to be sure to be following up on that. But that's the table that's there and it shows how clearly what the budget proposal is for the full 28 to 34 profile and where everything sits together. That's why I've included it there. Because they're familiar with the facts. That's why I asked the question at the outset of Deputy Kenny. We're talking about the 20% reduction, but yet the EU's information is saying it's been funded similar to the current cap. Which is the truth? And where do you find the truth? Where do you go? You don't go to chat GPT or AI and do a search on Google. You know, you have to have a place for a repository in which documents can be referenced, they can be reviewed and then they can subsequently be challenged as being, yeah, these are the facts, not someone's hearsay that they heard in the pub that there's going to be a 30% reduction in the cap payment and everyone goes marching. You know, it's too big of, this is too big a deal not to have accurate information being shared. And one of my challenges through this committee is what are we doing within our own agricultural department to make sure that the information is being shared in a timely manner? Just for your, just to answer back, the cap budget, I think it was £293.7 billion. Yeah. Now, that's what you're saying, but going by before, there's like two parts to £291 and £95. That's what I'm looking at. Mr Farg, yeah. Thanks, Chairman. No, Deputy, you're talking about the 20% cut, where do we, what do we cut, where do we cut it and I suppose the big thing is here we have to look at production, but we also have to look at the smaller farms there and try and keep them viable, but there's some ways of them dying out all over the country. We need to be looking at keeping a fair share of the payments in that area. I think, going back there, perhaps earlier on, that fund there, that the security for the police in Europe, and that's the fund I mentioned there a minute ago, there's a lot of money there that can be capped up on, maybe the eco scheme or eco payments will be taken out of it and let the original payment go back into the cap as we knew it, without the eco, and let all eco payments come out of it and I think that's what we should be looking at. Furthermore, on food sustainability, as I mentioned, I don't want to repeat myself, that is another target that can be got in these funds. We have to be looking at this with our MEPs in Europe there and trying to negotiate to get these things across the line because if we start looking at where we're going to cut our own people here in our own country without getting back in here first and foremost, I think we're going down the wrong road. We have to be sure that that support is coming from not our own budget but from outside that budget because we have more than lost and I've paid it over the years and I think that's what we have to fight hard to get. Thank you.