Herbert: Ministerial decisions lie at the heart of the Single Farm Payment failure
15 October 2009
Responding to the National Audit Office report saying Defra and the Rural Payments Agency have showed negligible regard to protecting public money, Shadow Environment Secretary, Nick Herbert said:
“This report exposes the abject failure of Ministers to get to grips with the chronic problems of the Rural Payments Agency. Vast sums of taxpayers' money has been wasted on excessive administration costs and fines to the EU, yet typically Ministers who should be held accountable for this dismal state of affairs still refuse to accept their responsibility. It is time for a fundamental overhaul of the Agency to get a grip of the farm payments scheme once and for all.”