Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Let me be straight with Deputy Pringle. I cannot give him the detailed answer he wants because there are ongoing discussions which we hope will be helpful in securing the jobs at Silvercrest. They are commercially sensitive at this point. If contracts are to be rebuilt to allow the infrastructure at Silvercrest to be providing large volumes of burgers to clients, something fundamental needs to change to facilitate that. I have been working with the industry and the clients concerned to find a way to do that. We have made some progress but I am not in a position to be able to give the Deputy any more detail on it.

I can assure the Deputy that we have not forgotten about the 140 or so people working at Silvercrest who are innocent victims in this. Likewise, it was the same problem last night for people working in Rangeland who had nothing to do with this scandal. We are working with the industry from an Ireland Inc. point of view. We want to be supplying large customers like Burger King and Tesco in the UK. It is my job to facilitate progress to do this. When I am in a position to give more detail on this, I will do so.