Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

We could spend another month discussing this matter. We are going nowhere. Ultimately, while we are talking, farmers' businesses are going down the tubes. There are people who invested a great deal and whose farms are now haemorrhaging money. I wish to focus on a dichotomy which I perceive to exist. There has been a great deal of discussion with regard to a grass-based system. Does the production of 16-month bull beef constitute a grass-based system or is it a meal-based one? My understanding is that these animals have to be fed ad-lib meal. We are codding ourselves.

I do not know whether the marketing people present have an answer to my second question but I will pose it in any event. How many head of cattle do the beef factories have in the feed lots they own on contract and that are on call for slaughter at any one time? I ask this question in the interests of discovering whether, if farmers held back their animals, the factories would have a ready supply of animals for slaughter.

The third matter to which I wish to refer is one that is of importance to Bord Bia. Is there any information available from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine in respect of the importation of Polish beef into Irish factories to be processed and then exported? What steps have been taken to ensure that none of that meat leaves the country labelled as Irish beef to be sold in foreign markets as such?

Many people believe that since the horsemeat crisis of last year and the introduction of much better checks in factories in the context of what product is going where, a huge differential has opened up between Irish and British beef. I must state bluntly that there are those who are suspicious as to whether there is or there is not a connection in this regard to the much greater level of scrutiny in respect of what is being packed into boxes in factories. Perhaps our guests from Bord Bia might indicate how I might establish whether a steak I order in the Members' restaurant tonight originated from a side of 16-month, 18-month or 20-month bull beef or whether it is steer beef, heifer beef or any other kind of beef. Would I be able to identify the source from which the steak came? There are too many unanswered questions regarding the differential in the price.

Since 1997 Stena Line has consistently refused to carry livestock on the Rosslare to Fishguard and Dublin to Holyhead routes. Which shipping company carries livestock from Larne to Cairnryan?