Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue defended his Department’s performance on TAMS in the Dáil on Wednesday, stating that it’s not fair to suggest that there’s a backlog of farmers awaiting approval.

Responding to questions from Cork TD James O’Connor, the minister said the Department is trying to sequence TAMS approvals because it can’t be done “all in one go”.

“Let’s remember that it opened up over a number of months and only closed the 1 July.

“With a record number of applications, we have to work through those in the most efficient way possible,” he said.

The minister highlighted that over half of all applications have received the green light, and that they’re for the mobile TAMS for farm machinery.

Deadline

He explained that before the 15 September deadline, the Department also received notice of urgent applications from farmers who needed approval to complete works this autumn.

However, McConalogue said that if there are other farmers in this ‘urgent’ category, they should be brought to his attention.

This suggests that even though the deadline for urgent applications has passed, the minister is open to dealing with cases brought forward by his fellow TDs.

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