Guy Smith is the NFU Vice President. He writes:
As the goal-posts continue to move, the BPS saga continues to unravel. Having met with senior RPA and Defra officials numerous times over the past few weeks, we continue to have major concerns.
Our fundamental point here is that farmers are not in any way to blame for the current problems. Therefore it is wholly unacceptable that, as a result of these problems, farmers could be penalised with late payments.
I understand that the RPA is now segmenting applicants into different categories. Around 35,000 of the 90,000 applicants are considered ‘straight-forward cases’ - primarily those who don’t have greening requirements. Farmers in this category will be emailed about their claim, starting from this week (w/cApril 13).
Our concern is that the email addresses the RPA are using might not be regularly or routinely used by the farmers. The RPA must monitor these electronic communications to see if they are being opened by the appropriate person.If the emails are not getting through then there must be a quick postal back-up.
It may also be the case that these applicants are not as ‘straight-forward’ as the RPA believes. Again the RPA needs to be checking if this is the case and, if not, then liaising with the claimants involved.
Then there are those who do have greening requirements. The RPA tell us these farmers will be emailed pre-populated forms from April 13.It is not clear how long the RPA will need to email everyone in this category but the NFU will be complaining very loudly if we find members have not received forms by April 21.
What we find increasingly frustrating is the continued delays following the IT melt-down in February and March. In previous years farmers received the necessary information to start applications in early March – a full ten weeks before the usual close of applications on May 15. This year we are in danger of being two months behind this timetable.
Although the situation is partly relieved by the new June 15 cut-off date, this delay will undoubtedly put pressure on the ability of the RPA to make payments promptly at the December 1 start date. To try to stop this seemingly inexorable march to late payments the NFU is demanding that well-resourced, user-friendly advice is given by the RPA to ensure farmers can submit applications in good time and in good order. In particular we want to see well-staffed, well-located, advice centres open at times convenient to farmer hours.
On top of this, Defra must accept that the RPA will need extra resource in the summer to process and check applications in enough time to hit the early December payment window.
We are also very concerned that the system has become a confusing combination of paper and e-mail. We see no good reason why pre-populated forms cannot be posted out to applicants just as the maps and the guidance booklet will be. By relying on e-mail to send out pre-populated BPS forms the RPA are risking confusing applicants as to where exactly their forms are coming from.
They are also risking forms being printed out on farm-office printers in formats that may cause problems both to at the filling-in stage and when they arrive at the RPA for digital transcription. Finally, by relying on email the RPA are reviving our previous concerns about broad-band capacity in farm offices as well as how e-enabled some farm businesses are. There is also the issue of whether the email addresses the RPA have on their system will actually reach the appropriate person.
