The Government is working closely with farmers and industry stakeholders to design a future SFI offer that fairly and responsibly directs funding towards the Government’s priorities for food, farming and nature. The Government has committed to providing more information about the reformed SFI offer later this summer. The analysis and recommendations set out in the Committee’s report will be considered in developing plans for the reformed SFI offer. This Government inherited farming schemes which were underspent, meaning millions of pounds were not going to farming businesses. However, this Government also inherited an uncapped SFI scheme aimed at mass participation of farm businesses, despite a finite farming budget. A record number of farmers are now in farming schemes, and more money is being paid to more farmers under the SFI than ever before. There are more than 39,000 live SFI agreements currently in place, under which money continues to be paid to farmers this year and over future years. Earlier this year, the Government had successfully allocated the entire SFI budget and could therefore no longer accept new SFI applications. We closed the scheme to new applications on 11 March 2025. We did not give any advance notice because we needed to ensure fair access to the scheme and avoid creating a sudden increase in the level of demand. However, it later became clear that a message had been shown in error to people who had started an application and then saved it without submitting, telling them that they would be given 6 weeks’ notice before applications closed. The Government has addressed this situation, and further details were set out in a Written Ministerial Statement by the Minister for Food Security and Rural Affairs on 12 May 2025. The 2024 SFI scheme re-opened on 7 July 2025 for a limited period for applications from affected farmers and some previously announced exception groups only. These applicants have been written to by the RPA. For all other farmers, SFI currently remains closed for applications.