Mr. Martin O'Halloran:

Táim an-bhuíoch den Seanad as ucht an cheist seo a phlé inniu. We are very appreciative of the work of the Seanad Public Consultation Committee in bringing this topic forward. It is something to which we are very committed. We have provided the committee with a submission but I do not propose to go through it in detail. However, I will cover some of the key elements of it.

The first point on which to reflect is that our work tends to be focused on risk. One of the charts we have provided shows that the primary cause of fatalities and, indeed, non-fatal accidents in agriculture is tractors and farm vehicles, followed by farm machinery. Between them, they account for almost 50% of all fatal accidents, followed by livestock, drowning, gas and falling from heights. Those five basic causes cover more than 80% of the fatal accidents arising. That is really where the focus of our effort must be.

In terms of the work of the authority, analysis points to dairying as the single highest-risk sub-sector within agriculture by a significant margin. In the context of the economic evolution of agriculture in Ireland, with the abolition of quotas, dairying will become an even more important sector, with significant projected growth. This morning I heard the figure of projected economic output rising to €10 billion, so it is very important to work individually and collectively to achieve significant improvements, because it is not acceptable that we are a world-class food producer at the cost of the lives of farmers, their families and workers.

I will give an overview of some of the work the authority does. Sometimes there is a perception that we are prosecutorial body. That constitutes a minority of our activity. The main thrust of our work is education, advice, information, guidance, inspection on a collaborative basis, discussion groups, codes of practice, farm safety walks, talks and conferences. In terms of the agricultural community and our engagement with it, what I call the enforcement aspect is quite minimal. We tend to operate in a partnership and supportive model. We work collaboratively with all of the organisations that made presentations today. That is the first thing I would like to stress.

In terms of education, it is not always known that we have a module available on our e-learning website which is available to every primary school in the country, and we have communicated that to each of the more than 3,000 schools. It is a free e-learning online module on farm safety, which is available to every school. We also have interventions at second level and at territory level. We work with colleges and universities to influence the content of the syllabus for agricultural science degrees and those professions which ultimately end up in farming.

In terms of advice, we give advice through our website. Each year, although not limited to agriculture, we have in the region of 1 million downloads and many hits. We work through social media, including YouTube, Twitter and LinkedIn. We also produced a code of practice a number of years ago which was issued free to every farmer in the country.

It is also available for completion online and later this year, we expect to go live with a BeSMART tool. This tool is available free online to anyone who wishes to use it. It is a self-help tool to help people to do hazard identification, risk assessment and identify the necessary controls. Indeed, I saw the board game the young man presented earlier. It is not dissimilar, in terms of progress, in that it starts off asking what are the hazards, what are the risks, what are the controls and how does one do them.

The farm safety partnership was established in 2002 but was given renewed life a number of years ago. On that, we have participation from all of the farming stakeholder bodies. Approximately three years ago, we were probably a bit of a lone voice articulating the agenda for farm safety. However, we really welcome and see it as progress that it has now become a significant national agenda item. In 2015, we will progress with discussion groups. We will do approximately 2,500 farm safety visits. We tend to use the language of farm safety visits because, by and large, they are positive, advisory and provide information and farmers are invited to participate. We also do farm safety walks and we provide inspectors to conferences. Indeed, many of the farming representative organisations seek to have an input from an inspector, so inspectors willingly provide that input morning, noon and night. They are willing to travel.

In terms of some of the initiatives we believe will have to happen, we wish to lead with a positive approach but I remind the committee that, in terms of achieving the cultural and behavioural change that is necessary, it must be a mix of what one might call the carrot and stick approach and positive and not so positive incentives. I remind the committee that the success Ireland has achieved as a world leader in terms of plastic bags was through advice and information but there was a sting in the tail when everybody had to pay 22 cent per bag. Similarly, we have achieved world leader status on the smoking ban in which the Health and Safety Authority was very much involved. That was achieved through a combination of advice, awareness raising and information but it did pose a challenge to those who did not comply. Equally, drink-driving and all of the other significant behavioural changes which have been achieved in Ireland have had a number of discrete elements.

We work in collaboration and closely with Teagasc and we will continue to do so.