Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank ICOS for being here and I agree with Deputy Fitzmaurice's suggestion. I want to elaborate on the point he has made because ICOS's opening statement states: "It is important to clearly state, that these are agreed contracts, which unfortunately cannot be renegotiated." That is not how contracts work. A contract means it cannot be amended unilaterally. Contracts are changed all the time and they are negotiated as a result of changes in positions. If all parties to a contract agree to change it then it can be changed, whatever the case may be. I have an article from Agrilandfrom a week or two ago and this is probably an extreme case because it is a farmer who has 85% of his milk pool in fixed-price contracts. He has 900,000 l in a milk contract and that represents 85% of his milk. That is 33 cent per litre and the other 15% of his milk is on the open price, which is 43 cent per litre. The difference across those prices for this gentleman is €108,000. Can the witnesses clarify who is getting that €108,000? That is what the market has valued his product at, yet it is being lost, so someone along the chain is getting it. Who is effectively pocketing that €108,000?