Danny Healy-Rae on planning, land purchases and young farmers

I want to welcome you here. Thank you very much for coming in to us because it's good to see young people wanting to go into farming and wanting to stay in it and we appreciate you very much for that. I suppose he mentioned about planning and in Kerry we maybe are better than what we seem to be hearing from you because farmers' sons and daughters are more or less guaranteed planning. There's other people in between, maybe neighbours, that can just have a site or maybe buy a site from someone local. They've given all their life in that area. They're having trouble getting planning. And I've asked the Taoiseach and the Tarnas and the whole, they'd let them see if they'd do something about that because the clause that's depriving those people who get in planning is called the urban-generated clause where they're trying to stop people coming out of the towns. But what they're doing in tandem with that, they're stopping the people that never were in town that are outside the country. And I can kind of understand that that could be happening in your countries as well. You mentioned about pre-planning. Johnny, he had a motion before Kerry County Council last week demanding that, and the council committed to give you a four-week turnaround for pre-plannings. So some councillor or someone in your area would want to get at them about that as well because they have drifted to 11 or 12 or 13 weeks, and that's a total of the year. So he'd do well to stay at that because that will have to be changed. I see the problem where they say you can't get land to lease, and you see, and I can understand that because we've talked about it here at the last number of meetings. These environmental schemes, you see, as well as being paid out of the cap for to leave land on it, and to the likes of you, or yourselves, should be considered for the payment out of the cap program, people that are producing something. And that's because food security in a very sharp oil will be of utmost importance to farmers and to consumers because we are only a small island. And if we're defending in Europe or even depending on Brazilian places and New Zealand to supply beef and lamb, we'll finish up, we could finish up in a tight corner and paying an awful price for it. So we should be appreciating so much more. The thing about generational renewal, I suppose it's happening everywhere, and we need to get some scheme going to entice farmers like the one that used to be there before up until 2005 or 2006. It was a great scheme where farmers got so much to retire, and the young fellow, the young girl got a boost to start them off. So we, I can understand that, and I can understand why farmers are a bit reluctant, or young farmers as well, because there's nothing sure in farming. And like you've said there, it is a way of life, and we were never sure of anything from one year to the next. And things are so much different now, because people are, many people in our communities are used to a work-life balance. And in farming, you don't have, you don't have that. Willie was out at three o'clock last night. I got my coat to camp at three o'clock yesterday, but that doesn't always happen. So it is a demanding and enormous job. If we lose the catch, the coal's gone for the year, you know, it was sucking. So how, do we see, do we have a lot of TB in ear areas? Is that, is that hitting, it's hitting Kerry very hard at the present time. Do we have that in ear counties? Depends what parts of the county you're hitting, then a lot of it too. Like up, me or myself, but heading up, I would have went to college, there's a lot of lads from Galway, a lot of lads and girls, and it's extremely, they'd say hard now, even purchasing an animal up around East Galway. But I suppose multiple dairy farms in around them areas, that's a lot of it too. So it is in that area. Yeah, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're trying to keep sheep front and centre. Oh, all right, that's all right. What we have happening in our area, much of the sheep ground, fellas, before there was two or three fellas in every yard, and one could go to either side of the hill, you know, a place would go down into the waste, into what we call the waste, the national path. But people are not leaving their sheep, they haven't as many, you know, because they can't just patrol the hills. And the, the sheer size, I know you have quads, but there's places quads don't go, and Monaco are not safe to go. So, have you some of that in your places that, that fellas are cutting down the numbers? I suppose I'll just touch, firstly, on work-life balance. I suppose it's a fine line, but at the same time too, we are very lucky as children to be able to work with our parents, work with our siblings, be it in the evenings or Saturdays and Sundays. Because, again, we're learning skills for life, I suppose there's not too many people who get that opportunity, and we just want to acknowledge that we've got an awful lot of information and learned an awful lot from that generation. And we're keen to see those have a, have a confident future and have us, give us the ability to walk in their footsteps and take over. So, as I might hand over to Darren then, in terms of, yeah, plan. Could I say, you're saying about access to farms, we have a problem down in Kerry, that the state seems to be buying up land, but they're not buying it up for farms, they're buying it up to leave it idle. And in our own little parish, they bought about 56 acres last year, they gave 440,000 for it. And there was no way, there was no way it was worth half of that. And, and that is driving up the price of land. And I mean, is that happening in your counties? Which is, that's happening all over the country, even out, out our way, like you'll be heading out towards Leen, and then if mountains are coming up, it's companies that are buying them up, so to say, do you know? I wouldn't, we can't regulate outsiders, but we should be able to regulate the state and prevent them of buying agricultural land that people lived off of and could add to their farms if they're in a small place and want to add, ideal for, for people to start the out. As you were saying just about the old scheme, the old retirement scheme, so to say, like which is, what we're saying, you're bringing in a fund for the farmer so they can stand back, but they're still there to support the young farmer. So they can, you still have the help of your parents, your aunt, your uncle, they're still there, but you're getting the financial, not burden, but so to say, it's took off the older person, you have it, and so you're in control. And in more, a more realistic sense, like, if you, someone coming and going, and the parent is pushing into their 70s, and you've no financial out of it, and you're still unsure of who's getting the farm or what, if there's someone saying, well, this person is getting the farm, and you have the financial then sort of playback to go on of the retirement scheme, you're being looked after, and then the young farmer's being looked after, he is the land, and it's given the access to it. Well, if it's held on in, like, there's still great farmers in their 60s, in their 70s, who are highly intensive farmers, like, not saying anything against anyone, but, like, for the farmer that there is people out there that they want to keep the least amount of stock, as you say, go into a scheme where it's nearly looking like just to take the payment, keep the lowest amount of stock, that's grand in their own way, but if they have someone that is willing to take it on and stock the land and farm the land and get the payments while also being financially looked after themselves, where they're not stuck in a hole, wondering, sure, if I give this farm to my son or my daughter, what am I going to do? I'm heading in, I'm only young still, what will I do for money? So, that's sort of the point. Thank you.