Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this opportunity to speak and thank the witnesses for their detailed answers. The first issue that gives me and the small farmers I represent bother is the question of what the outcome will be for them. We must ensure that there is a ceiling on payments. If there are to be larger payments to individuals, it means there will be less funding available for smaller farmers, especially in a place like Kerry. I will give an example from when milk quotas were first introduced. I remember from watching television programmes at the time that a major case was made for larger farmers, in that farmers of 100,000 gallons or more would not be able to increase production. However, there was no discussion about the farmer with 7,000, 8,000 or 9,000 gallons. When the price of milk decreased, those farmers were blown out of it because the same laws applied to them as applied to large farmers and they were not allowed to expand.

This CAP round is a defining moment. Many farmers are at the crossroads, in particular small suckler farmers, and we must be careful not to lose them in this round. I see the term "genuine farmer", which is open to many interpretations. I hope that it does not mean one must be a full-time farmer or anything like it or that more of one's income must come from farming than anything else. If something like that were to happen, and given that so many small farmers are barely existing, the fabric of rural Ireland would be blown to smithereens. We must ensure it does not happen because it would ruin rural Ireland.

There are many issues to be considered. In 1986, a weanling sold for £730 at Castleisland mart. Recently, a weanling of the same weight sold at the same mart for €540. Look at how much water has passed under the bridge and flowed into the Atlantic in the past 33 years. Look at how costs have increased in the meantime. A farmer today gets €540 for the same animal that was sold in 1986 for £730. These are facts, so we must do something about them. What has gone wrong? In 2013, the Tánaiste was then the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine. He said that there was room to expand our milk production. That was great. While there were a couple of bad years, the last few years have been good for dairy farmers. However, there are now more dairy weanlings flooding the market and competing with the suckler farmer who is trying to exist. Suckler farmers are coming out second best. The genomics scheme is aiding and abetting that, as it requires a farmer to have a certain dairy element in the animals he or she breeds if he or she is to get a five-star rating. It is hurting our beef trade. We must examine it to see what can be done. Suckler farmers who have spent a great deal of money on housing, equipment and compliance with environmental regulations and spent time trying to perfect their trade will not be able to survive if we do not give them some help in this CAP round and address the issues affecting them.

On top of everything else, farmers are worried about exports because the landbridge that is Britain will see delays if the UK exits the European Union. That would signal the end of the suckler farmer and beef producer as I have known them for many years. If something like that situation surfaced, it would bury the whole lot of them.

Farm designations were mentioned. It is fine if the Department or someone else wants to designate areas for the preservation of the hen harrier or any other species, but what of the landowners? We commemorated the people of 1919 yesterday and will remember them forever. At that time, people struggled to get ownership of their land. Since then, many families have handed down their places to the following generations. Sadly, fewer are taking up the mantle of the land now, but people once had to struggle to hold their places or to buy and keep them going. It is not fair to think that farms would be taken from people or that the value of their places would be reduced by designations without their being properly compensated. I told the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy Creed, that. I am insisting that the designation should not be at the expense of the farmers and others who own them.

Fishermen's incomes must be protected. Quotas and the whole lot that-----