land, farms and CAP reverse taxes

[james armstrong]

Land , Agriculture and C.A.P. ReverseTaxes.

 

Starting from the proposition that
agriculture takes up most (77% )of  Britain’s land , but
the  234,900 ‘farmers’ comprise only 0.4%
of the population the  rationale of
rewarding 

some 104,900 of them  with cheques worth £3.3billion annually,
called Common Agricultural Policy payments, seems worth investigating.  

Especially since, to date this ,section
of the community is excused from   
budget cuts

although there is some £16billion
plus  cap payments up for grabs during
the life of this parliament.

 

Another way of putting this is
that  some 95% of  us who own no bulk land pay-  mostly out of income tax,-   £3.3billion every year and rising to   a tiny privileged section of the
community  among whom (perhaps half of
them)  are landowning  ‘land £millionaires.’

 

Today 
owning  166 acres - less than what is considered a viable farm , may qualify you
for this ‘land £millionaire club’

 

Perhaps like many of us, I have been
too busy, or distracted, to look into this anomaly.

A web site,  cap-payments.defra.gov.uk   , gives access to  a search engine to trace individual
payments.   To the Queen,  to the Duchy of Cornwall, to your local
landowner  to Lords, Dukes,   Jockeys, Master of Fox Hounds, Sugar
refiners, distillers, Church of England, 
RSPB etc. its all there.

 

This site also gives links which help
answer the £3.3billion question, What is the Common Agriculture Policy and what
is the rationale  behind the payments?

 

These are  big questions – as befits big payments - and
below I give just a flavour of the goodies which  links on 
the cap-payments web site reveal.

 

In the coming days I mean to gen up on
CAP by writing off for literature to RPA (Rural Payments Agency is the  defra department which disburses cheques  and monitors the  schemes.)

The Schemes  are many, obscure, difficult to understand,
and surprising.

Did you know about Butter for non
profit making organisations. Casein in cheese making- control of and   Goatmeat- external trade?

 And deciding eligibility of  yr 2005 quarries for yr 2008 wine growing (in UK)  yes.  And orchards 2005  for orchards 2008 -No.

There is an alphabetical ‘soup’ (sorry
) index with 100 ‘ingredients’ sorry 
schemes to look up. – I’ll be busy. 

 

The Rural Land Register sounds
interesting , especially since  each
farmer is issued with an up to date map of 
his holding , I read-

“The Rural Land Register was updated
during 2009 and early 2010.

The Rural Land Register (RLR) is a key
database for RPA (Rural Payments Agency) 
and the wider defra family.   The
RLR mapping update project involved sending farmers updated maps  of their holdings and asking  them to confirm that they were correct  or to send us any changes  that were required.”

 

"RPA was established  ….to be a customer focussed organization…."

 

I mean to  pass myself off as a customer – specifically  a taxpayer – and   get as many answers as poss from  this government agency.   

  
 

Would anyone  informed about some aspect of CAP please  pass on this information to me?  Perhaps someone with an agricultural holding or
food manufacturer claiming CAP? Im interested in the admin which must be horrendous and I know is Dickensian and very costly. 

James .     Dorchester .    

  		 	   		  
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