Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. O'Halloran and his colleagues for outlining in very vivid detail the impact this is having. We are all acutely aware of the trauma and stress suffered by families who have lost a loved one in an agricultural accident and others who have sustained horrific injuries. As Deputy Heydon has said, in addition to the families, the whole community is devastated because very often these people are the backbone and bedrock of community activity and have contributed so much to developing communities.

Very often relatives come out and talk - brave people they are - and that is very important. We saw that with the recent "Late Late Show" appearance of Mr. Rohan who established Embrace FARM. I have a brother who has been a farmer for 44 years and is very experienced. When we hear relatives speak in the wake of a family tragedy, they often suggest that the victim was a very experienced farm operator and the person one would least expect to have an accident. That has to be taken into account.

We are dealing with a wide variety of causes of accidents from the involvement of equipment and implements. It involves power take off, PTO, balers, slurry agitation as well as loading and animal handling - in particular, animal handling after calving. Those are areas in which farmers are very experienced and yet something can happen. The last thing we need to do is to regulate farming activity out of existence.

In the course of a case in the 1950s, a judge said that to make accidents impossible would virtually require people to stop work. That is the starting premise. Even though we have the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 1989, the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005, the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (Construction) Regulations 2006, and the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (Construction) Regulations 2007, we still have accidents happening. Even employers who follow every aspect can find one little thing left out.

I am all in favour of safety statements, but they need to be simple and we should avoid getting them bogged down in legalese, which is a disaster. It is not that farmers resist them, but the last thing we want is a plethora of legalese that would necessitate a farmer having a lawyer alongside to ensure that everything was being done right. Let us focus on the simplification of it.

It is vital to have more direct contact and interaction, and persuasion with a hand on the shoulder giving guidance and advice rather than mandatory regulations. That means wholescale involvement with stakeholders. We need to involve those people who have spoken out and who play a huge role in bringing focus to this. I believe a representative from the Health and Safety Authority was also involved in the recent television programme. I meet many farming people in Westmeath and they have been talking about it. People are focused on it, which is a huge help in that regard.

The farmyard is a challenging workplace environment. As Deputy Heydon said, in the 1960s and 1970s when we were growing up we pursued some activities that would be frowned on now. It was less challenging and a more relaxed environment. Deputy Fitzmaurice is right in saying that everything is now done at a particular time, including synchronised calving. Everything is now happening all together. When we grew up one could be calving over a three or four-month period. Now calving all takes place over a week. The Chairman knows more about sheep. It is now possible for a farmer to have 500 lambs born in couple of weeks. At one time that was scattered out more. There is pressure on people. Perhaps because of the economic situation there may be less help on the farm than heretofore. Sons and daughters go off and get an education which opens up avenues.

Accidents could have happened in the 1960s and 1970s that were not reported and lots of chances were taken. I took chances myself with farming activity from a very young age. When I look back at it now, I would say that the Health and Safety Authority would have grabbed me by the back of the neck and turfed me off the thing altogether. We have to look at where we are.

If the Health and Safety Authority starts into an enforcement regime, it will not work. Guidance, help and interaction are required with a huge focus on education. Every farmer under 35 has to get a green certificate and everything else. When I completed my agriculture diploma, as Mr. O'Halloran knows, there was a full module on farm mechanisation and equipment. In Multyfarnham Agricultural College we had to sit through hours of the theory and multiple hours in practice with PTOs, slurry agitation and working down in the dairy. We did that under Mr. David Jordan, who was an excellent teacher and I never forgot those lessons. Has the Health and Safety Authority made contact with the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine to suggest that as part of getting that certificate a farmer would be required to do eight or ten hours theory with people from the Health and Safety Authority and then do the practice, even going out to some dairy farm?

No one size fits all. Different farming activities attract different levels of challenge. There are some very intensive dairy and pig farms and others being run by a single farmer on his own. It needs to be tailored to the activity that is taking place on the farm. As part of that certificate, there should be focus on a safety course. It would only require about five hours of theory and five hours of practice. That would be a good way to ensure that people who achieve certification would be taking on board a practical application. That certificate is very important in terms of capital gains tax and capital acquisitions tax when taking on a farm holding. It should focus on the fact that a person is taking on not only a farm, but this as well.

Practical application of solutions is more important to us at this stage. Everybody working together, including this committee under the chairmanship of Deputy Doyle, should be focused on ensuring that we minimise accidents. However, we must start with the premise that to make accidents impossible, we would have to call off all activity. Every one of us set out this morning in the car with the view that the last thing we wanted to happen was to have an accident. Then something happens for a moment and we have an accident or somebody else runs into us. That is an important starting point.