Stormont’s agriculture committee is not supporting a plan to reverse recent changes to cross compliance penalties.

The committee voted last week to oppose proposals to remove a cap on penalties for repeated minor breaches of rules.

The proposal from Agriculture Minister Andrew Muir relates to changes that were introduced two years ago by his predecessor Edwin Poots.

Prior to 2022, repeated minor breaches of the same rule within a three-year period was deemed to be an intentional rather than a negligent breach and so resulted in much harsher penalties.

Edwin Poots changed this so repeated negligent breaches were no longer deemed intentional, however Andrew Muir now wants to reverse that decision.

Outlining the proposals last Thursday, Jason Foy from DAERA explained that negligent penalties will still apply to farm payments for the first three times that a minor breach is found.

“After that, we would move out of the negligent part of the matrix, with penalties typically at 1%, 3% and 5%, into the intentional penalty element of the matrix which can go from 15% to 100%,” he said.

Speaking to Stormont’s agriculture committee, Foy explained that the penalty cap for minor breaches affected 35 farms in NI last year and 37 farms in the previous 12 months.

“For comparison, the total number of farms found to breach cross compliance standards in 2023 was 613, so 5.7% of those farms that breached had their penalties capped,” he said.

Campaign

The decision by Minister Muir to try to lift the cap on penalties follows on from a campaign by environmental groups in the wake of blue-green algae in Lough Neagh.

However, Foy told MLAs that of the 35 farms that had penalties capped last year, only three of these related to rules about the protection of waterways.

Vote

Following the briefing, the agriculture committee held a vote on whether to support the plan or not. The only member to vote in favour was Minister Muir’s Alliance Party colleague John Blair.

“We will report that to the department and […] we will wait for the department’s response,” said committee chair and Ulster Unionist MLA Robbie Butler.