Mr. Michael Sheehan:

A number of options are being discussed by the TB forum. Earlier, we spoke about risk. I will provide an example. A dairy farmer with 200 animals will have invested a considerable amount in his herd and facilities. If he needs to buy 20 cattle, the last thing he wants to do is to buy a TB problem. However, he is buying a pig in a poke at the moment. He has no way of knowing if he should buy 20 cattle from Joe Blogs, Paddy Smith or whoever. However, we have the information and know with a good degree of accuracy what his risk would be by buying from one herd as distinct from another. The question is as follows. Should we make that information available to a person with a dairy herd of 200 or even a herd of 50 suckler cows? Do they have a right to know which herd represents the lowest risk? Should we warn them that if they buy from herd A the risk of buying in a problem is X and if they buy from herd B the risk is Y. These are some of the difficult decisions. Obviously, if-----