Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Hold on now. Retail Ireland represents these retailers and the specifications have been here for three, four and five years, and in the last year. Nothing has changed. I am asking the question. Did the housewife or the person who buys the food decide? How come it changed all of a sudden when the numbers got tight? Is it the processor or is it the retailer? Who is it that decided that nothing could be said at present because the numbers were not there? What is the cause? With the new legislation coming in we will be monitoring what we can put into it in the line of amendments. It raises an eyebrow for anybody that in 2019, the retailers needed a list of stuff as long as a copybook to have with an animal when it was going for sale but this year they would grab your hand for an animal. How come that happens when over three and four years ago, it was put out that we had to have X, Y, and Z or the animals would not be accepted? Is it the retailers group, which Mr. Dillon represents, or is it the middle person between the retailers and the farmer that is deciding a lot of this?