EU subsidies shifting away from real farmers

Golf clubs, horse-riding schools and railway companies are among the British landowners who have benefited from a "tenfold" shift of agriculture subsidies away from real farmers, European Union auditors have warned.

Refusing to sign off the EU's accounts for the 13th year running, the European Court of Auditors yesterday highlighted new faults in the UK's already crisis-ridden system for paying out Brussels farm subsidies to farmers. British payments, worth £9.7 million in Northern Ireland alone, were given to landowners who lease out their land for much of the year.

Payouts, claim the auditors, that "did not comply" with EU legislation. Auditors are concerned that Britain's controversial Single Payment Scheme (SPS) is transferring EU agriculture funding away from the people who do the farming to landowners, who include Royals, the landed gentry and some of Britain's wealthiest people.