Martin Browne (Tipperary, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome our guests. I find it funny that one of the witnesses said they do not know why the industry is being closed down. They told us that they have been engaging with the Department and the Department says there is a broad consensus among veterinary and other scientific experts as to why the industry should finish. What are the witnesses' feelings on that? What kind of engagement have they had with the Department or what reasons has the Department given them for closing them down? Most of the other questions I had have been asked but I want to come back to the compensation for the workers and the statutory redundancy. Do the farmers themselves intend to contribute anything at all to the redundancy payments for the workers? The farmers want the compensation to be based on earnings averaged over the past ten years instead of the five being sought by the Department. Following a spike in earnings in 2013, the figures have fallen significantly. Is it realistic to call for compensation based on those figures? As others have said, I will not even pretend to be fully up to date with fur farming but people worldwide are saying that the demand for fur is going down, which is different to the figures the witnesses have given us about the projected increase in the price of fur.