€40m still not paid in GLAS scheme

HUNDREDS of galway farmers are among the 10,100 glas participants nationwide who are still awaiting payments totalling €40m that were scheduled to be made before Christmas, according to West Galway TD, Éamon Ó Cuív.

Minister for Agriculture, Michael Creed, in a Dáil reply to Deputy Ó Cuív, said that out of a total of 37,500 ‘active participants’ in GLAS, 27,400 had received 85% of their 2016 payment [leaving 10,100 still without their money].

According to Minister Creed, payment ‘can only issue where all the required validation checks have been successfully passed – some 10,100 cases did not pass all the checks’.

“Work on processing these cases, including ‘development of further IT functionality’ is ongoing with a view to effecting payment as quickly as possible.

“A detailed county-by-county breakdown of those awaiting payment, as requested by Deputy Ó Cuív, is being collated and will be forwarded to the Deputy,” said Minister Creed.

The Minister said that out of 25,800 farmers in GLAS 1 (the first tranche of the scheme), 22,150 were eligible for a part year payment in respect of 2015, with 21,500 of those having received 85% of that payment.

In his Dáil question, Deputy Ó Cuív, sought to find out the number of farmers in the scheme who hadn’t received their 85% payment for 2015, broken down county by county, and the reason for the delay in payments.

He said that many hundreds of farmers across the West of Ireland were under the most severe financial pressure because of the delay in processing the GLAS paymentswith €40 million still outstanding to farmers across the country.

“These farmers were relying on the payments to be made in 2016 and had budgeted accordingly. Now they have to defer bills and vital farm upgrades because the money they were promised still has not been paid.

“Every day farmers are getting in contact with my office asking for assistance with this problem. Many of these farmers took out loans to carry out upgrade works on their farms with the knowledge that they would receive their GLAS and AEOS payments in a matter of weeks.

“MinisterMichael Creed has some serious explaining to do. His Department has struggled to meet deadlines associated with farm payments.

“It’s simply not good enough. Farmers need to know when payments are due to be made and they need to have confidence that these payments will actually be made on time,” said Deputy Ó Cuív.