Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans her Department has to help farmers who do not meet the deadline for applications to the Basic Payment Scheme.

Our focus remains on ensuring that the Basic Payment Scheme claimants are able to submit their claims by the deadline, indeed as of 8 June 2015 the RPA have received 58,836 completed claims, which is in line with the number of claims received in previous years.

In order to help farmers to be able to submit their claims by the deadline the Rural Payments Agency has 50 drop in centres open, 10 mobile support units in operation and a dedicated helpline. The deadline for claim submission is fixed by the regulation, although in recognition of the additional complexity the EU has already extended the deadline to the 15 June. Farmers and agents have received all the information and forms they need to submit claims. Support to farmers will still be available during the late claim period which runs to 10 July where applications can still be received but will incur a penalty.