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

We all recall this 25% figure, but everyone is asking me what that means in cow numbers. The Taoiseach has denied from day one that there is a cull of cows but there is an awful lot of ambiguity about it. I was glad Mr. Rushe said this will certainly relate to cow numbers, but his organisation's president does not seem to say that when he is appears on television. We cannot get an answer. Have our guests been told what it will actually mean for cow numbers? What does the 25% refer to?

Long ago, there was a fella in Kilgarvan post office who delivered telegrams for his sister. While he was travelling, he met my two uncles. He had been told not to tell anyone where he was going with the telegrams. He asked my two uncles whether he had much farther to go, and when they asked him where he was going, he told them to mind their own business. They could not tell him how far left he had to go when he could not tell them where he was going. Similarly, we do not know the answer to this question and we cannot tell farmers, who are asking me day after day what the 25% actually means. They do not know what 22%, 25% or 30% means in cow numbers.

Turning to my next question, how much fertiliser can farmers use and what is the purpose of this register whereby the co-operatives will have to demand farmers have a certain number or whatever?

On carbon emissions, are all farmers going to be treated the same or will they get any credit for sequestration? I mentioned this at a recent meeting of the committee. In our area, there are only a few dots of green fields, from the perspective of a high point in Kilgarvan, where fertiliser could be spread. The rest is bushes, rock, firs, trees and other natural features, all kinds of everything else but nothing on which to spread a bag of fertiliser.

In respect of land designation, it is totally ridiculous to think that a farmer's land can be rendered useless. We have a good idea of who comes up and down our road, and a man came up it the other day. He asked someone passing by whether it would be a good place for hen harriers. That tells me that people are watching with a view to designating it. There are people up our road who have bought farms and so on, and to think it could be designated for hen harriers when we never see a hen harrier there. They are not there, but this is the kind of carry-on that is going on, with people out looking to see whether they can stop fellas farming - that is the way I look at it - and render their farms useless.

Moreover, we need to get clarity on the rewetting issue. Farmers have too much put into it. If someone has given his or her life to a farm and tries to make it fit for cutting silage off it or to graze it, it cannot be right that some fella with a stroke of a pen somewhere can say the farmer must rewet it. If the fella below the farmer does it, it will back up into him or her and there will be all kinds of logistical problems. I have to say to every one of our guests from the farmers' organisations that they must try to get an answer to these questions for the farmers whom both we and they are representing. It is not fair on people. They ring their co-operatives and cannot get an answer as to what it will mean or how much fertiliser they can get. The one thing that has happened is that the co-operatives are telling them that if they do not order it now, they will not get it at all until next spring. How much should they order and how much will they be allowed to spread?

We need answers. I am not aiming my gun at the Chairman, but our Taoiseach is out at this COP27 and he is saying we must cut our emissions or whatever the case may be. We must be honest and have a discussion with the stakeholders, including everyone who farms with a few animals. I have the utmost respect for Deputy Ring; he is a great man and there is no doubt about that. Nevertheless, he is with the Government and he is asking questions about how it is going to achieve this or that-----