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Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee 25 January 2017

25 Jan 2017 · S5 · Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee

Item of business

Common Agricultural Policy Payments

Ewing, Fergus SNP Inverness and Nairn Watch on SPTV

No—I do not need a delay. I am just amused by the question. In a sense, it is a perfectly pertinent one—particularly for people who are not versed in all the acronyms and all the different schemes. They might look a bit perplexing to the outsider; they are sometimes perplexing to insiders. I will try to answer the question. Plainly, the purpose of the schemes is to provide financial support to our farmers, crofters and land managers. The schemes have largely been influenced by EU policy. It used to be the case, of course, that the system was based on production, but that system became unpopular—perhaps because of food mountains. The system was therefore changed at the behest of the EU in about 2003 and member states were given three options for introducing the new land-based payments scheme, which has led, in turn, to a proliferation of schemes. Schemes here have been devised by the Government in Scotland, working with representatives of the farming and crofting sectors, and principally with the NFUS. We—quite rightly—still work very closely with those representatives. The situation at the moment is that we must allocate 4 million hectares’ worth of new payment entitlements, for about 400,000 fields, in three payment regions, for more than 18,000 farmers. I understand that the average field is the size of several football pitches. Each field needs to be mapped in a certain way, with a number of location points taken in order to establish the exact location of every single boundary. That work is required by the system because a digital map is required. The system has proved to be immensely complex. I say—with the benefit of hindsight—that perhaps all those who have been involved, including representatives of farmers and Governments, might have traded a bit of complexity for some administrative simplicity. 11:00 I do not know whether members have any appetite for looking at the future of farm payments. I certainly do, because if the UK Government intends that we come out of Europe in March 2019, there will be only two more years of the CAP and I have no idea what will replace it. I note, based on a statement that she made recently, that Liz Truss does not know, either. As a pointer for the future, it should be recognised that there is a trade-off to be made in order to avoid a system that is so complex to administer that we have to devise a very complex IT system. I hope that Annabel Turpie will have the chance to explain exactly what we have been doing over previous weeks—she has been leading the work in a very vigorous and determined fashion—to implement one of the most complex IT systems that exists. Your question hit the nail on the head, Mr Lyle.

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Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee 25 January 2017

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