Cap reform convergence

wrangler

farawaygrass wrote: »

It’s not great in fairness. BUT it’s also not fair that people who farmed intensively at the right times, 20 years ok, are getting bigger grants now and might be doing feck all. You have defended this before, saying anyone any good knew to build up entitlements. The whole grant system is skewed towards lads now who farmed or who’s father farmed intensively then. Often we see the next generation who come along who are making a great go of it after maybe their father didn’t run a good operation. It’s unfair that they are penalised as such.
I don’t know what the answer is though. Production based won’t come back for a long time, if ever.
When based per ha, will the lad with 200. Acres of a mountain get the same as a lad with 200 acres of prime lowland?

I don't defend my position,ie. getting subsidies and doing nothing, hence my criticism of young people away from home getting them and doing nothing as well.
As for keeping subsidies of twenty years ago and still getting them, well that's as fair as 35yrs milk quotas ever was.
Interestingly I put your last sentence to Luke Ming flanagan at a CAP reform meeting in 2013 as I knew of one hill case and if convergence happened then that hill farmer would have 20,000 SFP plus disadvantage in 2020 and mine would be 20000 too,
I had 500 sheep then and the hill farmer had 50. I don't know what that hill farmer is getting now, probably a lot more tha 20000 but mine is as forecast.
The important thing is that hill farmer has loads of time to work off farm.
Flanagan said I shouldn't need subsidies and I said I need them because he's doing such a lousy job in Europe

farawaygrass

wrangler wrote: »

I don't defend my position,ie. getting subsidies and doing nothing, hence my criticism of young people away from home getting them and doing nothing as well.
As for keeping subsidies of twenty years ago and still getting them, well that's as fair as 35yrs milk quotas ever was.
Interestingly I put your last sentence to Luke Ming flanagan at a CAP reform meeting in 2013 as I knew of one hill case and if convergence happened then that hill farmer would have 20,000 SFP plus disadvantage in 2020 and mine would be 20000 too,
I had 500 sheep then and the hill farmer had 50. I don't know what that hill farmer is getting now, probably a lot more tha 20000 but mine is as forecast.
The important thing is that hill farmer has loads of time to work off farm.
Flanagan said I shouldn't need subsidies and I said I need them because he's doing such a lousy job in Europe

Is there such a thing as a fair cap for everyone then-probably not. Is production based the fairest, but it’s the total opposite direction cap Is going so we won’t see that

eire23

The journal doesn't make for great reading this morning. Anyone with high value entitlements is looking at a nice cut. Also the talk of €30 per ewe and €300 per suckler cow is never going to materialise imo. I'd have thought we were lucky to be getting the tenner per ewe for stuff that we would be doing anyways.

_Brian

eire23 wrote: »

The journal doesn't make for great reading this morning. Anyone with high value entitlements is looking at a nice cut. Also the talk of €30 per ewe and €300 per suckler cow is never going to materialise imo. I'd have thought we were lucky to be getting the tenner per ewe for stuff that we would be doing anyways.

Define “high”

I haven’t looked through entitlement values coming across our books in some time but I’m quite sure I’ve seen sub €60 and up to €750 entitlements, I believe the latter were the result of stacking.

eire23

_Brian wrote: »

Define “high”

I haven’t looked through entitlement values coming across our books in some time but I’m quite sure I’ve seen sub €60 and up to €750 entitlements, I believe the latter were the result of stacking.

Id have thought 400 or that was a high entitlement value. Anyone on that will be down to 230 by 2023. Not a nice situation for anyone farming full time and depending on it.

J.O. Farmer

wrangler wrote: »

there is a partnership thing too where the parents entitlements are topped up by up to 3000/yr and a substantial tax reduction if the son/daughter farms with them. I don't know the details but I know people that are doing it and the sons/daughters are doing feck all on the farm, probably spending it in Coppers.
I think one of the conditions is that the farm is signed over in five years.
I was tolerating losing my entitlements until that racket started

Not familiar with that particular scheme, it must be a new early retirement scheme (the last one was used by older people in the same way as the Young Farmers Scheme now)

A lot of these cases sound like the parents using the child's name on paper (with their knowledge and consent) to maximise their own income. Technically possibly fraud from all involved but you can't assume the money is being spent in coppers.

The childs name will have to be on the farm account but it doesn't mean they're spending from it. On the other hand children can abuse parents and use them, it's always been that way. I've heard of a farm round here sold from under the parents probably 100 years ago now but nobody can tell what goes on behind closed doors .

I know other genuine cases too where the child is farming alongside a full time job. In those cases the top ups etc. are fair enough.

_Brian

eire23 wrote: »

Id have thought 400 or that was a high entitlement value. Anyone on that will be down to 230 by 2023. Not a nice situation for anyone farming full time and depending on it.

Banks have out allot of money on strength of payments.

J.O. Farmer

_Brian wrote: »

Define “high”

I haven’t looked through entitlement values coming across our books in some time but I’m quite sure I’ve seen sub €60 and up to €750 entitlements, I believe the latter were the result of stacking.

Anything over the national average is probably high relative to a lot of people. They don't give the national median value but I'm sure it's probably a fair bit lower.

Magic A

wrangler wrote: »

there is a partnership thing too where the parents entitlements are topped up by up to 3000/yr and a substantial tax reduction if the son/daughter farms with them. I don't know the details but I know people that are doing it and the sons/daughters are doing feck all on the farm, probably spending it in Coppers.
I think one of the conditions is that the farm is signed over in five years.
I was tolerating losing my entitlements until that racket started

I think this might be the scheme you are referring to no mention of entitlement top ups but there are tax credits to avail of


https://www.teagasc.ie/media/website/rural-economy/farm-management/Fact-Sheet-succession-farm-partnerships-September-2018.pdf

wrangler

Magic A wrote: »

I think this might be the scheme you are referring to no mention of entitlement top ups but there are tax credits to avail of


https://www.teagasc.ie/media/website/rural-economy/farm-management/Fact-Sheet-succession-farm-partnerships-September-2018.pdf

Go to page three of this, you'll see about the top ups. don't know if this scheme still exists but there was huge incentives at teh time. it came in in the lastCAP reform and it's looking like there might be good incentives in this cap too.
However I haven't read to days IFJ yet.

https://www.teagasc.ie/media/website/rural-economy/farm-management/Get-Financially-Fit-Farming-Independent-August2015.pdf

The pity is that this scheme is hugely abused

kevthegaff

Herself done the greencert and we have a joint t herd number, she is a housewife with 3 kids while helping on the farm as much as possible. We applied for the young farmer top up and set up a joint account, all payments went through this account with some other farm stuff. Anyway got an inspection recently and the top up has been rejected due to some of the milk cheques not going into the joint account and a few cheques we lodged in our nearest town which is of a different account. Disgusted I am

Bullocks

kevthegaff wrote: »

Herself done the greencert and we have a joint t herd number, she is a housewife with 3 kids while helping on the farm as much as possible. We applied for the young farmer top up and set up a joint account, all payments went through this account with some other farm stuff. Anyway got an inspection recently and the top up has been rejected due to some of the milk cheques not going into the joint account and a few cheques we lodged in our nearest town which is of a different account. Disgusted I am

Can you appeal that or is it worth it?

_Brian

kevthegaff wrote: »

Herself done the greencert and we have a joint t herd number, she is a housewife with 3 kids while helping on the farm as much as possible. We applied for the young farmer top up and set up a joint account, all payments went through this account with some other farm stuff. Anyway got an inspection recently and the top up has been rejected due to some of the milk cheques not going into the joint account and a few cheques we lodged in our nearest town which is of a different account. Disgusted I am

I’m a paper pusher allot of the time myself.

There are definitely two approaches, some groups bend over backward to support folk and make things happen, then there are those who couldn’t care less and will stick it to a fella over the slightest detail. As my boss would say, why would you go to work to make people miserable when with a little effort you can help them.

J.O. Farmer

kevthegaff wrote: »

Herself done the greencert and we have a joint t herd number, she is a housewife with 3 kids while helping on the farm as much as possible. We applied for the young farmer top up and set up a joint account, all payments went through this account with some other farm stuff. Anyway got an inspection recently and the top up has been rejected due to some of the milk cheques not going into the joint account and a few cheques we lodged in our nearest town which is of a different account. Disgusted I am

I think they're auditing hard this year, probably because of Covid these can be done remotely and also to save any money they can.

I only got the 2020 payment a couple of weeks ago after an audit. The payment should have been made last December.

JohnChadwick

wrangler wrote: »

Interestingly I put your last sentence to Luke Ming flanagan at a CAP reform meeting in 2013 as I knew of one hill case and if convergence happened then that hill farmer would have 20,000 SFP plus disadvantage in 2020 and mine would be 20000 too

Isn't that where this GAEC2 thing comes into it? Could be totally wrong but isn't all hill land under this?

No idea how this GAEC2 works alongside CAP to be honest, whether it redistributes payments or what.

MayoAreMagic

wrangler wrote: »

I don't defend my position,ie. getting subsidies and doing nothing, hence my criticism of young people away from home getting them and doing nothing as well.
As for keeping subsidies of twenty years ago and still getting them, well that's as fair as 35yrs milk quotas ever was.
Interestingly I put your last sentence to Luke Ming flanagan at a CAP reform meeting in 2013 as I knew of one hill case and if convergence happened then that hill farmer would have 20,000 SFP plus disadvantage in 2020 and mine would be 20000 too,
I had 500 sheep then and the hill farmer had 50. I don't know what that hill farmer is getting now, probably a lot more tha 20000 but mine is as forecast.
The important thing is that hill farmer has loads of time to work off farm.
Flanagan said I shouldn't need subsidies and I said I need them because he's doing such a lousy job in Europe

Well in fairness, the young lads in coppers are spending it on drink and fags - highly taxable goods, what are you spending yours on?!
Re the hill farmer scenario. First off, you say you had 500 sheep, but how many of those were needed to collect the payments? I dont think you are comparing like with like there. Theoretically, you could reduce numbers down to minimum and take up a second job also, could you not? So that bit isnt really fair.
Furthermore, you probably have the guts of 1000 high value lambs to sell come market time, the hill man has 45 skinny hill stores that will average 50 euro if he is lucky.
That is the thing - people are still being paid for production here, they just dont realise it.
Personally id be of the mind that people on good quality land that can produce higher value animals that are fit for the factory off mainly grass, are already being rewarded by the land itself, so I dont get why they would need higher value entitlements also.

JohnChadwick

Yep same view as that above, who says intensive productive farming is 'good farming' and should be rewarded moreso in the subsidies.

Young95

So if I have a current unit value of 263 which includes greening for 2023 and on to keep it at that level il have to do the 20% eco scheme? Or am I still going to lose money with convergence?

Bitten & Hisses

From what I've read on the issue, the real problem seems to be a budget reduction and that convergence is almost a smokescreen.

In my opinion, capping the overall payment to individuals should be the first task, then look at some form of convergence if necessary to solve the budget problem.

farawaygrass

MayoAreMagic wrote: »

Well in fairness, the young lads in coppers are spending it on drink and fags - highly taxable goods, what are you spending yours on?!
Re the hill farmer scenario. First off, you say you had 500 sheep, but how many of those were needed to collect the payments? I dont think you are comparing like with like there. Theoretically, you could reduce numbers down to minimum and take up a second job also, could you not? So that bit isnt really fair.
Furthermore, you probably have the guts of 1000 high value lambs to sell come market time, the hill man has 45 skinny hill stores that will average 50 euro if he is lucky.
That is the thing - people are still being paid for production here, they just dont realise it.
Personally id be of the mind that people on good quality land that can produce higher value animals that are fit for the factory off mainly grass, are already being rewarded by the land itself, so I dont get why they would need higher value entitlements also.

Obviously, and naturally people are defending their own situations. But isn’t that what the anc is for? There is a massive variation of land quality in every parish in Ireland, not mind counties, so very difficult to dish it out as it was meant. I know of one sizeable farm in east Galway and they are the only farm in the area excluded from anc

Dinzee Conlee

MayoAreMagic wrote: »

Well in fairness, the young lads in coppers are spending it on drink and fags - highly taxable goods, what are you spending yours on?!
Re the hill farmer scenario. First off, you say you had 500 sheep, but how many of those were needed to collect the payments? I dont think you are comparing like with like there. Theoretically, you could reduce numbers down to minimum and take up a second job also, could you not? So that bit isnt really fair.
Furthermore, you probably have the guts of 1000 high value lambs to sell come market time, the hill man has 45 skinny hill stores that will average 50 euro if he is lucky.
That is the thing - people are still being paid for production here, they just dont realise it.
Personally id be of the mind that people on good quality land that can produce higher value animals that are fit for the factory off mainly grass, are already being rewarded by the land itself, so I dont get why they would need higher value entitlements also.

Why couldn't the hill farmers also take a second job the same as wrangler. The SFP isnt dependant on stock numbers, so both could leave their land idle and still claim it whilst working off farm...

Dinzee Conlee

Bitten & Hisses wrote: »

From what I've read on the issue, the real problem seems to be a budget reduction and that convergence is almost a smokescreen.

In my opinion, capping the overall payment to individuals should be the first task, then look at some form of convergence if necessary to solve the budget problem.

ha ha, but what cap do you apply? :cool:

Just to be devils advocate - a living wage, is 12.30/hour (see here)

I think that works out about 25k / year

Should this be the cap?
If not, why should someone get paid over this?

MayoAreMagic

farawaygrass wrote: »

Obviously, and naturally people are defending their own situations. But isn’t that what the anc is for? There is a massive variation of land quality in every parish in Ireland, not mind counties, so very difficult to dish it out as it was meant. I know of one sizeable farm in east Galway and they are the only farm in the area excluded from anc

Well I have no issue objectively assessing my own along with everyone elses. I get what you are saying as regards the anc, and that would be fine, if the rate of pay across all land was the same to begin with. The ANC would balance it up. Now it is a small payment and what kind of balancing it actually does, in respect to the 1000 high end lambs versus the 45 bottom of the barrell store lamb argument wrangler made earlier, but that is a different debate.
The fact is the level of pay isnt the same across all land, but it would be with convergence, hence the push for it from europe.
To my mind, convergence isnt the issue, but rather how it was ever needed in the first place. Guys complaining about it should actually be starting to realise how biased the thing was in their favour for so long. Instead they seem to feel hard done by that others might get a fair rate for a while. Its hard to fathom

MayoAreMagic

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

Why couldn't the hill farmers also take a second job the same as wrangler. The SFP isnt dependant on stock numbers, so both could leave their land idle and still claim it whilst working off farm...

But that was his point. He said the hill farmer could go out and take a second job and therefore had it handier. I was pointing out that actually he could too, and that his choosing to have 500 ewes would be no different to the hill farmer choosing to do the same, at which point he wouldnt be able to have a second job. Therefore it wasnt a fair argument to make against the hill farmer...

wrangler

kevthegaff wrote: »

Herself done the greencert and we have a joint t herd number, she is a housewife with 3 kids while helping on the farm as much as possible. We applied for the young farmer top up and set up a joint account, all payments went through this account with some other farm stuff. Anyway got an inspection recently and the top up has been rejected due to some of the milk cheques not going into the joint account and a few cheques we lodged in our nearest town which is of a different account. Disgusted I am

I was helping someone with an application and how important the joint account was and them getting suppliers accounts changed to both names.
It's a major part of the scheme

kevthegaff

Bullocks wrote: »

Can you appeal that or is it worth it?

Ya we appealed, shes gona look for a hearing now

Dinzee Conlee

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

both could leave their land idle and still claim it whilst working off farm...

Nope. Land must be kept in GAEC. To do that the lowland farmer can top it two or three times a year.

How do you top a hill or mountain?

JohnChadwick

Where can you find out what your greening entitlements are per hectare?

Bitten & Hisses

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

ha ha, but what cap do you apply? :cool:

Just to be devils advocate - a living wage, is 12.30/hour (see here)

I think that works out about 25k / year

Should this be the cap?
If not, why should someone get paid over this?

There's no easy answer to this - I was thinking more along the lines of the principle from which to approach the issue. No matter where the bar is set, someone will feel hard done by, whether it's 25, 50 or 100K per year.

Dinzee Conlee

Bitten & Hisses wrote: »

There's no easy answer to this - I was thinking more along the lines of the principle from which to approach the issue. No matter where the bar is set, someone will feel hard done by, whether it's 25, 50 or 100K per year.

I agree with you.

And I know there are some people getting very large payments, but say putting a cap at 100k seems a bit pointless to me.

I think it needs to be a limit where the money above that, when redistributed actually makes a difference...