Debate contribution: Supply Resolution for the Northern Ireland Spring Supplementary Estimates 2023-24 and Supply Resolution for the Northern Ireland Estimates: Vote On Account 2024-25
Debate contribution by Mr Declan McAleer on .
- MLA
- Mr Declan McAleer
- Party at the time
- Sinn Féin
- Date
- 9 April 2024
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Executive Committee Business
- Heading
- Supply Resolution for the Northern Ireland Spring Supplementary Estimates 2023-24 and Supply Resolution for the Northern Ireland Estimates: Vote On Account 2024-25
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4481889
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I welcome the opportunity to speak in the Supply resolution debate. As I said in my Member's statement, there are many issues facing the farming community. The Committee Chair touched on the some of those during his contribution, such as the reduction in spend on TRPSI. As we know, the tackling rural poverty and social isolation programme is an example of a relatively small amount of money going a long way in rural communities to deliver projects and programmes on the ground. We also know that farm support has not kept pace with inflation. As I mentioned earlier, Brexit has had a huge detrimental impact. Now that we are out of the common agricultural policy, which was not perfect but did provide a seven-year budget, a level of uncertainty has been created. Certainly, we welcome the £332·5 million for single farm payments in the 2024-25 financial year. As we know, that is really important income support for food-producing families and farms. We know that it is also important in keeping the cost down for consumers. While we welcome that funding for this year, the danger is that we have no future certainty about it. If we do not get certainty from the British Government, who pledged, pre-Brexit, that they would replace lost EU funding pound for pound, and if that ring-fenced budget is not continued, it could create a cliff edge for our farmers.
The TB costs are in the region of £50 million. There is £38 million for compensation and just over £10 million for running the programme. The Department needs to get to grips with that, because if that cost could be brought down, it would free up additional funding and expenditure for other aspects of farm and rural support. Indeed, we were very scathing about the threats that were made by the Secretary of State, Chris Heaton-Harris, to impose new charges on farmers for bovine TB testing and future cuts to compensation. We feel that those are very punitive. Farming and rural affairs are in the eye of a storm. We have Brexit, climate change and other world events like war, which have had a huge inflationary impact on input costs. That has all added to a sense of uncertainty. We call on the British Government to live up to their pre-Brexit pledge to replace EU funding pound for pound, because our farmers and rural communities need that degree of certainty.
404 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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