Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the gentlemen. I share the Chairman's disappointment that the Ministers were not in a position to attend as I know they are committed to this issue. The hard questions are the ones we would like to ask the Ministers and we do not necessarily want to ask the witnesses hard questions. With that in mind, however, the witnesses are public servants of many years standing. I put it to them that it is only recently that the Department has taken the issue of farm safety seriously, given the spiralling number of deaths on farms. Approximately 400,000 people in this country live on farms. How would the witnesses react if I was to say that I have read the submissions and there seems to be a clear conflict between the various submissions we have received? For example, farming associations do not want to see legislative measures or penalties as such; they want to see education and awareness and a change in habits. However, submissions from the Health and Safety Authority suggest that it would like to see more penalties - that may be the wrong word - some sort of fines or prosecutions, perhaps. I would like to hear the witnesses' thoughts in this regard.

Second, with regard to the issue of farm safety, would it be preferable for the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine if this issue was to be the responsibility of an independent organisation that could bring the various organisations together? For example, I refer to a one-stop-shop which would be independent of all the agencies but working with them and with the sole remit of farm safety and able to make recommendations binding on the Department as well as on other operators, as opposed to the Department and the Health and Safety Authority dealing with it. Would it be better to have one organisation to which the Department and other agencies would report and co-operate with, as opposed to the current structure?