Single Farm Payment Applications
To ask the Scottish Government what percentage of single farm payment applications in the Highlands and Islands and in the rest of Scotland has been paid as of the end of January. (S4T-01304)
One moment, Ms Urquhart. Can we check Ms Urquhart’s microphone? I, for one, am having great difficulty hearing what she is saying, and I see from nods around the chamber that everyone else is in the same position. Given that the member’s question is on the order sheet, I will go straight to the minister for an answer. However, I ask that we ensure that Ms Urquhart’s microphone is working when she asks her next question.
I confirm that the percentage of first instalment payments made in the Highlands and Islands is broadly similar to the percentage of payments made in Scotland as a whole. At the end of January, about 28 per cent of farmers and crofters in the Highlands and Islands had received payment; as I announced last Friday, the equivalent percentage for Scotland was almost 30 per cent, equating to about 5,000 applicants. Since then, I can confirm that about a further 1,000 payments have been authorised, bringing the total to more than 6,000 payments, which is about 34 per cent of the total amount. I will, of course, keep Parliament informed about the payments, and I will write to the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee every Friday to update it and Parliament.
Let us try again. I call Ms Urquhart.
The cabinet secretary will know that many crofters in the Highlands and Islands region are having a difficult time. Late payments, combined with winter feeding, poor weather and low prices for beasts, are not helping. There is still deep resentment about the €230 million that the coalition Government did not forward to Scotland as was intended.
NFU Scotland is claiming that, although 30 per cent of claimants have been paid, that amounts to only 15 per cent of the budget. What have the claimants in the Highlands and Islands been paid in cash terms and what percentage of the budget is that? When can the many crofters facing hardship expect to be paid?
I say to Jean Urquhart and other members that I appreciate the pressures facing many farming and crofting businesses throughout Scotland. They have had to contend with the recent storms and the flooding and wet weather over many months, as well as the low commodity prices and other issues facing the market not only in the United Kingdom and Europe but around the world. Of course, at the same time, we have had the biggest ever and most radical reforms to the common agricultural policy and to how it is implemented in Scotland. We are not only moving to area payments for the first time but introducing greening elements. Here in Scotland, we took an additional set of decisions to add more complexity to the new system—for good reasons, because we were trying to tailor a European policy to Scottish circumstances.
I am happy to ensure that the amount of money that has been issued to the Highlands and Islands is calculated in monetary terms, and I will forward that information to Jean Urquhart as soon as I can. In the meantime, I should point out that the reforms will lead to more payments going to the crofting counties between now and 2019.
We are doing our utmost to ensure that the payments go to as many crofters and farmers as possible before the end of March. The first instalment was to be a minimum of 70 per cent of the payment, but we have issued them with 80 per cent of the payment. I will do my best to keep Jean Urquhart and other members updated on the situation.
Is the cabinet secretary prepared to indicate to Parliament how many crofters in Shetland will receive their payments by the end of March, given that half have yet to do so? Will it be all the crofters in Shetland?
Will the cabinet secretary also clarify how much the crofters will get? As he knows from their response to his letter of 17 December 2015, most crofters and, indeed, farmers, across the country do not yet know how much they will get. Will he consider issuing a letter, as he did on 17 December 2015, to clarify that? That would provide assistance to banks and to others who are seeking to help crofters who are hard pressed at this time.
I reiterate that crofters in Shetland and elsewhere face a number of pressures at the moment. I am keeping the banks updated and hope to meet them personally this week. They are saying to the Government that they are maintaining credit and will be working with the industry during the coming months—I hope that they keep that up.
It is important that any member of the Scottish Parliament who is aware of hardship cases urges their constituent either to use the helpline that is available or to call into their regional office, where local staff will do their utmost to prioritise cases of genuine hardship. That is already happening.
The complexity of each case will determine the pace at which payment is made, which is why I cannot give Tavish Scott or other members precise figures. We are moving to an area-based system, and until we know what the accurate payments will be to most crofters we will not know what they will be for all crofters and farmers, because errors in applications and payment rates can influence the overall pot and what other farmers and crofters receive. That is why there is a two-part payment. We need as much information as possible, to ensure that the final payments are accurate. This is a transition year; it is the first time that we have paid out on an area basis.
The cabinet secretary noted that many crofters and farmers in my constituency are suffering at the moment, and I thank him for his comments about people who are experiencing hardship being able to phone the helpline or their local office, to make the case to local officials for a bit of help. People who have a cash-flow problem are the ones who will really struggle.
What is being done to ensure that lessons are learned from the process, so that the payments at the end of this year will be handled better?
Dave Thompson made a number of pertinent points. Many of the tasks that have been undertaken in relation to the information technology system are one-off tasks, because this is the first year after a radical reform of the common agricultural policy, in relation to not only pillar 1, which is direct payments, but pillar 2, which is the rural development programme. That has required 20 separate schemes to be launched in 2015 alone; in relation to direct payments we have six schemes, many of which have regional variations, because of the industry requirement to ensure that there is regional targeting, which the Scottish Government supported.
At the same time, we decided that area payments should be made at three different levels, depending on the kind of land, because we wanted to ensure that we targeted resources at the most active farmers and crofters in Scotland. Again, the approach was supported by the industry and this Parliament.
Many of the tasks in that regard are one-off tasks. We will continue to improve the IT system and we will certainly learn lessons, as Dave Thompson suggested.
Members will be aware that in 2005 there was a move to area payments south of the border, and major difficulties were encountered at the time—indeed, only a couple of per cent of farmers received payments by February 2005. Our rate in Scotland is much higher than that, albeit that we face similar challenges.
The Scottish Crofting Foundation says that only 1 per cent of its members had received payments by mid-January. The cabinet secretary might contact the Scottish Crofting Foundation to see where the discrepancy arises.
The cabinet secretary is aware that this is the time of year when crofters are feeding animals, so it is an expensive time of year for them. He has spoken to banks; has he spoken to suppliers about providing feedstuff? If not, the lack of available feedstuff and the lack of ability to pay for feed could lead to animal welfare problems.
I will pay attention to the issues that Rhoda Grant set out. This week we will ensure that as many agricultural sectors as possible are aware of the arrangements that are being made to expedite payments and of our confidence that payments will continue every week between now and the end of March, so that we get as many first instalments as possible out before the end of March.
As I said, the system is paying out. About 34 or 35 per cent of payments are in the system, and around 30 per cent of recipients had received their payments by last Friday. We will expedite payments as much as we can do in the coming weeks and months.
The cabinet secretary is often adept at deflecting attention away from the shambles of the £180 million IT system on which his reformed CAP relies—indeed, given time for reflection today I am tempted to suggest that it might have been better to have used a pencil. [Laughter.]
What assurances can the cabinet secretary give that the problems with the IT system, which are acknowledged, will all be addressed by the time that the next basic payment scheme application window opens in May, which is only three months away?
A separate team is working on the IT for next year’s payments. I assure Alex Fergusson that we hope to launch that as planned for the window for applications for next year’s payments.
I commend Alex Fergusson on how he manages to successfully deflect attention from the fact that the Conservative Government’s policy is to scrap pillar 1 payments and not have any pillar 1 and direct payments in Scotland. Some of us who are quite reasonable may think that there is some hypocrisy in his coming to the chamber and complaining about the timetable for direct payments when his party’s policy is to have no direct payments for Scottish farms and Scottish agriculture.
Earlier this week, I was contacted by a constituent who has yet to receive a letter that details her entitlement. The Government’s online record does not even show an acknowledgement of the farm that she and her husband rent. After having phoned the Government’s helpline, which the cabinet secretary referred to, she stated:
“staff aren’t even allowed to look up people’s payments ... we now seem to have fallen into the hole within the department where no one knows anything about our application.”
Having failed to meet the January deadline, what reassurance can the cabinet secretary give that the measures that he has now announced will allow my constituent and many like her to get the information and, indeed, the payments that they are looking for?
I reiterate that the applications have to be processed before any payment can be made under European regulations. We would much rather be further forward than we are and have payments going out more quickly, but because of the reasons that I gave earlier, we are giving a timetable that will get as many payments out as possible between now and the end of the March, with the balance being paid in April.
Each case very much depends on its complexity. The timetable for when there will be payment depends on that. If Liam McArthur has a specific case, I would be pleased to hear about it, and I will certainly investigate what the particular crofter or farmer has been told.
For completeness, only this week I was approached by farmers in Ayrshire who intend to raise the matter of the payments at the next NFU Scotland meeting. They left me in no doubt that they are in great financial difficulties not only because of the delay in the payments, but because of the costs of supplying milk at the current levels. Will the cabinet secretary also pay attention to the south of Scotland and the difficulties that are faced there? I will write to him with the details of the farmers concerned.
I have agreed to meet a group of dairy farmers later this week, I think—I will firm up my diary today; there is no doubt about that—because I very much recognise the financial pressures and market situation that are faced by our dairy farmers in Ayrshire, south-west Scotland and elsewhere in Scotland. One reason why we are throwing as much effort and resources as possible at getting the payments out in the coming months is that we recognise that they need that support for their cash flow.
Scottish agriculture now faces a range of coinciding factors. We have seen the weather, such as the storms, and the flooding and, of course, we see the market conditions, particularly in the dairy sector. That coincides with the transition year into the new common agricultural policy, which is the most complex ever and has involved the most reforms happening ever at the one time.
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