The publication of the annual report from the EU Court of Auditors at a time when the Irish farming organisations are entangled in a difficult dispute with the Government may be entirely coincidental; but it will certainly do little to bolster the farmers' case - or to win public sympathy. The Court portrays a system of EU farm spending that might be politely labelled as inequitable: 40 per cent of direct aid for arable crops goes to just 4 per cent of farmers and 70 per cent to 10 per cent of farmers. Less than a third of all the cash goes to 90 per cent of farmers. The report also underlines how Irish farmers, more than any other group within the EU, reap the maximum benefit from the CAP. In all, the subsidies paid by Brussels to Irish farmers - some £1.5 billion in farm guarantee payments last year- work out at over £8,000 per farm, over twice the average payment. Commenting on the report, the Irish member of the court, Mr Barry Desmond, expressed concern at the manner in which the bigger farmers continue to pocket a disproportionate amount of subsidies. In his customary thought-provoking style, Mr Desmond - long a thorn in the side of the farm "establishment" in this State - wondered why this inequality is not addressed by the Irish farming organisations.
It is to be hoped that the Court of Auditors' report will help to concentrate minds in Government as it responds to the current crisis in the farm sector. While many farmers have certainly fallen on hard times, it is also the case that the very sizeable income of many large-scale farmers has proved remarkably resilient.
The Government, in seeking to alleviate the current difficulties, might do more than simply respond to the demands of the IFA by launching one-off funding programmes in response to specific needs. Instead, it should consider more searching questions. Is the current system of funding farmers defensible? Should the funding system be redefined in order to provide greater equality and to assist genuinely disadvantaged farmers? In truth, these questions have hardly ever been addressed by successive governments. The focus, not unnaturally, has been on securing the maximum possible "take", with little concentration on the overall fairness of the allocation. But this State may need to develop a more sophisticated negotiating strategy in the very challenging period that lies ahead. The EU's plan for a further reform of the CAP and pressure in the next round of world trade talks for deep cuts in EU subsidies pose a serious threat to farm incomes. The Government may no longer be able to adopt a broadly-based approach towards farm spending. It may need to address more seriously a critical point advanced by the Court of Auditors: "The indiscriminate granting of subsidies to agricultural operations which would be fairly profitable without subsidy cannot be justified".