Pat O'Neill (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I know that, but for years Northern buyers were coming to the marts in the South and buying cattle. They were keeping the price of summer cattle at a reasonable level. There were buying cattle, bringing them to the North, fattening them there and selling them on. There was no cut. Suddenly, these specifications appeared. I never knew anything about specifications like these. They were never produced by factories in respect of the price they were paying for cattle. These include specifications such as 70 days in the herd for quality assurance, if there have been four movements, they will not take or kill the cattle, and if livestock has been reared in the South and killed in Northern Ireland, it is discounted. There were never such specifications before. Suddenly, when there is a little oversupply, the factories are using the change to their advantage at the cost of the primary producer, the farmer.