Farming Today - 15/10/2009

Millions of pounds is continuing to be wasted managing subsidy payments to English farmers. A new report from the National Audit Office says Defra and the Rural Payments Agency have shown 'scant regard' to protecting public money. Since 2005, the scheme has seen 304 million pounds spent on additional staff and 280 million pounds in EU fines for late payments. It also relies on an IT system which has cost a total of 350 million pounds. A further 43 million pounds of overpayments to farmers are likely to go unrecovered. It all means that the cost of processing a claim in England is now on average 1,743 pounds which compares with an average cost in Scotland of 285 pounds.