Danny Healy-Rae: Tell Farmers Why Their Solar Grants Were Rejected

I'm kind of in the same vein as Deputy Paul. I had fellows that were refused for whatever chance they were in sometime around last September, that kind of time, and we tried to set in where they fell down or why they weren't approved, and we couldn't get any direct answer as to what was wrong or what was missing, or where the goalpost was even, and we got an answer back to the tune of, like, the applicant can leave his application in place and put it in for the next round, or he can make further investments and apply with a new application, and, like, that to me is not transparency, you know, it's not very clear for an applicant that's spending money and holding up a job, and a job that he wants to badly do to help the environment and everything like that. And, like, it said down the end of it, that the Minister could apply new rankings to the next round, and, like, in other words, that the Minister could move the goalpost away from there altogether, and, like, I'd rather that the department be straight up with people, and look and tell them, we can't take your application at this time, and either try and keep just such a fellow is entitled to come in with an application such a date or something like that, rather than putting in the same application, or a different kind of an application, and he still don't know or won't know, is he going to drink the van or not, and I'm concerned with that kind of a story, and, like, the Deputy has said here already, I mean, where are we going when 90% of the solar thing won't be accepted at all? Sure, I mean, it's up in a heap, to be honest, and it's a bit fair to progressive farmers that just, like, tell them what the goalposts are, tell them what they're shot, I mean, this man didn't know what he shot, and I refueled him the same way, so maybe tell me a bit more about that. Yeah, and I think I might let others come in maybe on more detail on the criteria, but if you take the solar capital investment scheme, for instance, there's a range of criteria that John referred to earlier on, from the age of the applicant through the size of the holding, the production units, whether it's in an ANC area, for instance, and what its nitrate situation as well is in terms of stocking. When it comes down to the ranking and selection, if you have a very high number of applications, then it's a very fine line in terms of the marks that are given across each of those criteria to individual applicants. So in terms of us explaining to people as to where they fell short, I mean, where they would have fallen short was simply in the case that, I don't know, maybe the area was a factor or the fact that the applicant wasn't a young farmer, was over 40 years of age, potentially might have affected the overall distribution of marks, and we can look at that, because I don't think we say to people when we tell them... Could it be the case that there's too many applicants for that particular time? I can see Tilbury Hartford and the likes of us that's going around the doors looking for votes at election time. Such a fellow down the road got the very same thing, and I didn't get it at all, and I asked him about it, and I'm still in the same place, I never moved. There must be some set of criteria or guidelines that a fellow will have to obtain, or should obtain, and if he gets those, he should be told, look, we have the money for you at this stage, and close it up with that until you're able to give him the money. Advertising for another tranche, and putting more players into the pitch, and this fellow is still left behind? I can't figure out that that's fair at all. Well, see, again, it gets back, I suppose, to the fact that it is a demand-led scheme. We don't know how many applications will come in from applicants under each heading. We don't know how many people will apply for each individual scheme over the course of a tranche, so it's difficult to predict in advance whether or not we might have to apply ranking and selection in order to control the expenditure in that particular tranche. We have to wait and see what the profile of the applications that comes in is. You've run away from me altogether because there should be a set of rules there, look, and if we pass 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 19, and you didn't get it, it's very wrong to tell a fellow that there may be different rankings in the next, and the minister may interpret the rankings differently in the next tranche, and maybe one of those fellows, pass him out, you know, not get it. I mean, the same rules should obtain for every man and woman that's going for the scheme, and if he haven't the money, tell him that, and that tells him about the story that he missed by point something, and won't tell him what the point something is. I take the point. Well, there is, there is... Where will I be the next? There's another one. Yeah, look, there is money available, but there just isn't enough money available to approve every single eligible application that comes in, which was the case over the first eight tranches, but is no longer the case now. The terms and conditions of the scheme, so in other words, the kind of the standing criteria that govern the operation of the scheme, they apply equally to everybody, and they are applied equally to everybody, wherever they live, whatever proximity they might live to each other. The question is just when it comes to managing the budget then. We have to do it in a way that essentially only allows for a certain proportion of the people who apply for that scheme to be chosen, and that's where we use the ranking and selection criteria. The ranking and selection criteria are available, they're on the department's website, I think they're in the terms and conditions of the scheme, they're available to every applicant, everybody who wants to participate in TAMS, it's made clear what the ranking and selection criteria are, as well as the terms and conditions of the scheme, and they are applied equally to everybody. It's just that the ranking and selection criteria will determine and will whittle down the number of applicants depending on what particular category they fall into, whether they're younger or older. It's the biggest sadness of a story that I've ever had. It's like telling the lesbian uncle, Garen, that pays 31, and when they get someone matrixed they'll reach 31, but when they get the next hand, it could be 35, or it could be 36. That's the biggest cock in the bull of a story that I've ever had, Chairman. Either the fella reaches the criteria, or the set of guidelines has followed, to change the guidelines according to the amount of people that's applying for it, give it up and forget about it, because this fella's gone mad over this. Just to reiterate, the guidelines aren't being changed in the sense that the terms and conditions remain the same for everybody. The terms and conditions of the scheme are applied to everybody. It's just that when the budget is limited, and we have to cut back on the number that can be approved, we use the ranking and selection criteria that are set out in the terms and conditions. But again, we don't know that we will have to apply those ranking and selection criteria until we see the profile, the number of applications that come in, and the number of schemes that they're applying for, and it's only then that we can assess whether it's necessary to apply ranking and selection. And then what they told him was, instead of telling him what that amounted to, you can apply again in the next tranche with the same application, let it go forward, or add in another investment and apply for a new application. That's not fair. I have not one bit in the world personally against anyone of you, only whoever is in the hope of operating this kind of a scheme, to their own, because this is not fair in my mind anyway.