Departmental Programmes
Seanad Éireann — 2026-07-01
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Jerry Buttimer (FG), Cork South-Central

I thank both Members for raising the matter. All of us in the House share an ambition regarding SICAP and LEADER. The Minister, Deputy Calleary, and I are committed to ensuring that we have a well-funded CAP that does not just support farm resilience and environmental ambition but also strongly invests in rural Ireland. I am acutely aware of the challenges that remain and are faced across many parts of our country. Senator Cosgrove mentioned the north west. In the programme for Government, we have a firm commitment around the whole allocation of SICAP funding. We are now living in a different world. That is the sad part. It is the battle that we must fight within Europe to ensure that money is not spent disproportionately. We must spend it on people in a different way that has real and tangible benefits.
We will work at European level to ensure that investment is targeted at local priorities and in the work we are doing. I have made the following point to many people in different forums. Without what we are talking about his morning, SICAP, LEADER, CLÁR or whatever else, we, as a world, are in big trouble. It is our job to continue to fight for those programmes and we will do so. I thank the Senators for raising the matter. I cannot give them certainty regarding the budgetary process for the allocations of money because that has not started yet. I assure them that both the Minister and I will do the very best we can to ensure the funding allocations continue to be where they are today.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-07-01/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:08+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-01