The Scottish Government has received £5.62m in unused crisis reserve funding from the European Commission. The fund is the return of the Financial Discipline Re-Imbursement (FDRI) cuts which came off 14,500 Scottish farmers who receive over €2,000 worth of support.

The Scottish Government can start repaying farmers their money from 1 December, but it estimates no money will go into bank accounts until direct payments are finalised in 30 June 2018 at the earliest, with all payments guaranteed by 15 October 2018.

Last year’s FDRI payment did not arrive until 13 October, when farmers received payments in bank accounts titled “Gov emerge”.