Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Mr. Healy should know because it is his job to know. The witnesses have come in with their statistics, and we heard statistics earlier from Ms Edel McGinley that completely contradict every single thing the representatives of Meat Industry Ireland have said here today. The witnesses have stonewalled and gone around in circles.

I am from a farming background myself and now I am in the construction sector. I have seen cases myself where migrant workers in meat factories were living ten to a house. When five came in from their shift, the other five left. They were sleeping on floors. Not only that, they were sharing the same footwear they wore in the factory to try to make sure that the footwear would last because they could not afford to replace it. That is because they were brought in here by agencies. The witnesses do not have the facts for me today on the agencies. Neither do they have the facts and figures on how many of the 1,100 cases of Covid-19 in meat plants were among non-EU migrants, EU migrants or Irish workers. It is their job to have the figures here today for me. I do not accept what they said about previous misconduct meted out to farmers by the industry.