Scots farming leaders have marched on Westminster, urging politicians from all parties to back calls for Scottish farmers to receive a fairer share of vital Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) funds.
Earlier this month a row erupted between Scots Rural Affairs Secretary Richard Lochhead and the UK Government over the distribution of CAP funds between Scotland, England, Northern Ireland and Wales. Mr Lochhead accused Westminster of “pocketing” nearly £190 million from Scottish farmers and crofters.
He said the funding, known as convergence uplift, had been secured to top up Scotland’s per-hectare direct support payments, which are the lowest in Europe.
Following on from this, NFU Scotland’s vice-presidents Allan Bowie and Rob Livesey, along with the union’s director of policy Jonnie Hall, met politicians from all parties to explain the situation.
“A key aspect of the recent reforms of the CAP is a more equitable distribution of direct support between both member states and regions,” said Mr Bowie.
The UK Environment Secretary Owen Paterson’s budget allocation went against this, said Mr Bowie, and his failure to deliver on European convergence plans bringing all per-hectare payments to £164 by 2019 was a missed opportunity.
NFUS said it has written confirmation from Mr Paterson that a mid-term review of the allocation of UK CAP funds will take place in 2017 once the Scottish Government has made the transition from a historic-based to area-based direct support payments system.
Mr Livesey said that the review must be robust.
“It must be made transparent, have an independent review group to determine budget allocations and have a fixed end date for when the transition will be completed,” he said.
In the interim, NFUS called for an advanced budget transfer of just above £9 million (11m euros) to Scotland the equivalent to the new convergence money the UK Government will receive in 2015.
“We estimate that the initial convergence allocation to Scotland in 2015 would have been worth 11m euros and could rise to 60m euros by 2019,” said Mr Livesey.
A Defra spokesperson said: “Scottish farmers will continue to receive the highest payments per farm in the UK, and one of the highest overall in the EU.
“The 1.6% decrease to the UK’s CAP budget will be shared equally across Scotland, England, Northern Ireland and Wales.”