As printed in the Yorkshire Post - 22/11/2006
Simon Mcgee

The farm payments fiasco has prompted Environment Secretary David Miliband to order the agency responsible to dramatically improve its monitoring of farmers' views and act on the findings.

The Rural Payments Agency (RPA) will now be required to conduct four surveys each year of farmers satisfaction with its service, Mr Miliband said in a Ministerial Statement to the Commons yesterday.

An RPA spokesman said the agency hoped the surveys would help to identify difficulties that officials may have missed.

"The quarterly findings will identify strengths and opportunities for improvement that RPA can build upon to improve its service to customers," he said.

"It will inform the development of a rolling action plan that addresses issues identified by our customers or specific problems and aims to deliver short term operational and longer term improvements."

Scarborough and Whitby Tory MP Robert Goodwill welcomed the announcement but added: "Knowing how upset and angry farmers are is no substitute for getting their claims processed as soon as possible."

There are an estimated 1,506 claimants who have yet to receive a payment under the 2005 payments scheme.