Commission report welcomed by Allister
05 April 2007
European Parliament Member Jim Allister has welcomed the report from the European Commission looking to simplify cross compliance inspections of Single Farm Payments.
Jim Allister commented, “There are a number of proposals coming from the Commission that I believe will improve the cross compliance inspection process. The Commission are proposing to give farmers 14 days notice for the majority of inspections. The Commission are also proposing to introduce a point type system and warning letters for minor breaches instead of fines.
“I believe that these changes should be introduced. I also believe that an urgent review needs to be undertaken by both DARD and the DOE into the cross compliance inspection process. It is important that Single Farm Payments are not delayed as a result of an unintentional error being identified during an inspection. This has happened over the last two years through duplicate fields and field variances.”
