The compulsory acquisition of farm land by the State for the £5 billion national road building programme is unjust, inequitable and seriously damages the livelihoods and viability of 8,000 farm families. The State has no right to appropriate farmland.

Farmers are unwilling sellers, being compelled to give up their land, and in many cases their livelihoods, by the use of draconian legislation by the National Roads Authority and local authorities. The origins of the Compulsory Purchase Order process are rooted in the British political and socio-economic emergency environment of the first World War.

As citizens, farmers are entitled to the protection of the State, but find themselves victims of the power of the State and its resources being applied against them as individuals. That is why farmers are being forced to resist the compulsory acquisition of their land.

While the CPO process was presented by The Irish Times on Saturday as reasonable and necessary for the common good, farm families who have lost their livelihoods as a result of CPOs see it differently in a very personal way and have been let down by the State in its duty to protect all its citizens.

Improved infrastructure is essential and should benefit us all. The farmland component represents less that 10 per cent of the cost of this £5 billion roads programme. Since the programme commenced two years ago, costs of stone and aggregate materials, provided by companies such as Cement Roadstone, have increased by over 20 per cent, and consultants' fees have rocketed by up to 40 per cent.

All of these interests are represented by the Irish Business and Employers' Confederation, which had the temerity to demand appropriation of farmland for road building. Naturally IBEC did not propose the compulsory acquisition of building materials or that profits on construction contracts should be fixed by arbitration. They make a case for the free market for their interests, but somehow farmers are to be treated differently. No doubt consortiums are already being formed to operate toll roads to profit from land taken from farmers.

Environmental interests resisted the Kildare Bypass, and the Dail Public Accounts Committee was told last week that the cost of protection of a snail habitat was £25 million, or over £2 million per kilometre.

Farmers are being served daily with CPOs for the land being taken by the NRA and local authorities. The county council making the order can take their land, even though the amount of the compensation has not been agreed or paid. The only remedy for the farmer is to refer to a property arbitrator, whose hands are tied by legislation going back over two centuries, and who will decide unilaterally on the amount of the claim to be paid.

Few landowners have the amount of their compensation determined by the property arbitrators. There are very serious risks of costs being awarded against an individual landowner with limited resources, compared to the immense resources of the State.

No farmer would sell a strip of land roughly 65 metres wide through the middle of his or her farm, dividing the unit built up over generations into two or maybe three fragmented pieces. To represent the CPO process as providing fair and reasonable compensation is a travesty. The IFA is available and willing to negotiate a proper scheme and procedures that will provide fair value for the division of holdings which understandably no farmer would ever dream of voluntarily selling for any purpose.

Contrary to an argument made by IBEC, and echoed by others, there will be no windfall for farmers whose lands are taken for roads. The standard proposed for all the national routes is motorway or limited access dual-carriageway. There is no opportunity for those farmers whose lands are taken to gain access to the road and develop their lands.

The comments carried in The Irish Times over the weekend suggest farmers should be prepared to surrender their land in the public interest, in some kind of recognition of the sacrifices made by the general community in the recent foot-and-mouth crisis. But it is a completely unreasonable argument to link our appreciation of the broader community effort with a denial of rights for 8,000 farmers to protect the livelihoods of their families, now and for future generations.

The State has a heavy duty to be fair and reasonable to all its citizens. While legislation to acquire land for motorways or road improvement is required for the common good, I firmly believe the State is undermining the rights of farm families by fixing payments for land using the iniquitous CPO process.

Tom Parlon is president of the Irish Farmers' Association