‘Yellow card’ is sought instead of fines

THE Dept. of Agriculture need to introduce ‘a yellow card’ penalty system for farmers who ‘come out the wrong side of inspections’,  instead of imposing sizeable fines, according to Galway IFA.

Last week, it emerged that Irish farmers paid fines of close on €5 million for failing to comply with regulations under cross compliance, the nitrates directive and land eligibility.

Although the scale of the fines dropped from €5.295m in 2014 to €4.884m last year, IFA leaders said this week that the scale and magnitude of the fines were penal on farmers.

According to the IFA, the average penalty for cross compliance was a cut of 10% in the average Basic Payment or just over €1,000.

Galway IFA Chairman, Pat Murphy, said that the days of heavy fines being imposed for what were fairly minor indiscretions, had to come to an end.

“We badly need a yellow card system where a farmer with relatively minor discretions gets a reasonable time to clear up the problem without a fine being imposed.

“The whole idea behind inspections is to ensure that farmers are complying with the regulations and that they correct any problems quickly – but imposing fines after a single inspection is a practice that needs to be ended,” said Pat Murphy.

He said that the IFA would have no problem with fines being imposed where a farmer made no effort to correct a problem but all of them should be given the chance to sort the problem first.

IFA Deputy President Richard Kennedy said this week that inspections cannot hold up payments and if there were issues with farmers’ files, they should be sorted out after the payment was made.

“Nearly half (43%) of farmers with a cross compliance issue in 2015 incurred a penalty. In total, farmers were penalised €4.42m last year. Almost 9,500 farmers were inspected last year,” said Richard Kennedy.

He also called on the Department to publish a county-by-county breakdown to give farmers the full impact of inspections and penalties in each area.

“We have recently met the Director of the Appeals Office to outline the importance of ensuring that farmers have recourse to an appeal against any decision made by the Dept.  of Agriculture.

“I would also remind Minister Creed that there is a commitment in the Programme for Government to review the work of the Appeals Office,” said Richard Kennedy.