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

I thank the Minister and Mr. Massey and Mr. Callanan for coming before the committee.

A few things need to be put on record. There has been a lot of commentary over the past week. Being honest, if the Minister had gone out to Europe and on the beer with Commissioner Sinkeviius for a week, it was not going to change the decision; that is being straight up. The simple reason is that we sent over a document on water quality which the Commission's scientific and legal people looked at and it made a decision. It is not even the Commissioner. If only people knew the truth of what goes on over there. We met a few commissioners and I put on record that it will be frightening if some of the stuff we heard comes to pass in the line of a single farm payment, which is starting on Friday week. I would like the Minister's comment on that.

A remark was made to us that indicated that they are basically going all environmental. If Pillar 1 goes all environmental, then we are in trouble.

In the line of the derogation, when we met the guy, Sinkeviius or whatever his name is, he said that Ireland applies the 250 kg N/ha derogation as a country and that we do not regionalise anything. We need to clarify one bit from Senator Lombard's statement because he stated that we were asking if we can revisit this. He said there would have to be new evidence and that it would have to go to a vote of the 27 member states. He told us bluntly that 23 or 24 of them have no derogation and that there would be no way they would support Ireland. He was very blunt about it.

In my opinion, and I would like the Minister's views on this, and I am saying this to all farmers and farmer organisations, there will be a battle in two years' time to hold the 220 kg N/ha limit. I ask everyone that whatever needs to be done must be done. The one part of it I am asking the Minister about is that a body giving stuff to Europe, and I am not a scientist, and that comes out politically and tells people not to eat meat has become political. I ask the Minister if funding would be given to the likes of Teagasc to do independent reports or research. Let us call a spade a spade: in our water quality monitoring, about 700 to 800 rivers in Ireland are not tested, there are 1,600 rivers are tested once per year, and about 260 or 270 are tested fairly regularly. The decisions that are made have a lot of consequences for the agricultural sector. From an agricultural point of view, and I am not accusing anyone of anything, we deserve an independent body on the farmers' side that is able to monitor this as well so that we know everything is being done right. I ask the Minister if he would look at giving Teagasc funding or working with the farming organisations to come up with an independent approach. I saw it done and we did it with the bogs, and in fairness it worked. Would the Minister allow that to be done?

I was the person who brought up the point on cows and heifers in calf in September. The man in question was not comfortable when I asked him what will happen and if he expects cows to be killed next February, March and April if they are in calf. I know the Minister will say this, and yes, there was a lot of commentary on this over the past year; there is no point in saying there was not. My understanding from him was he stated 30 September. He also stated that he would work with the Minister or the Department and that he would not like to see anything bad in animal welfare. There might be an opening there - I am not going to go making rash comments - under animal welfare because of the lateness of the final decision. I ask the Minister if he would look at that.

There is another thing that is worrying, and I think it is one thing we as a committee, farming organisations and the Minister's Department could learn, or I learned anyhow, and I think the rest of the guys learned, is that we went into different Commissioners, including the Commissioner for forestry, and all we were told about was the groups from Ireland on the environmental side that were going in and whistling their stories. We as farmers and our committee - I am not exempting us from it - should be going more often to those places, to those Commissioners, the legal people and the other ones who are with them, to give the story of the Irish farmer, because sometimes there may be a different story being told by others that is not helping our cause, and that was quoted to us. I ask the Minister's Department to do that more. We talked about it as a committee and I ask the farming organisations to do it as well.

The 220 kg N/ha is the next game in town. We can give out and call the Minister everything but I will not do that because the Commissioner has been clear. We can give out about everything and call everyone anything but the bottom line is that the decision was made in Europe with the tablet we sent over to them from the EPA. That is being quite frank about it. We gave them the medicine to finish us off. That is what I have to say on it. Some people might not like what I have to say but I am saying it.

Is the Department on course for the payments to farmers on 17 and 24 October? In fairness the person over it in the Department is very good. Will the Minister give me some update on moving cattle 65 km, which I hear about day in, day out? To put it simply, it is about a farmer going to a mart throwing a lot of cattle into a trailer and heading off 40 miles. Will the Minister clarify whether that farmer needs anything?