Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

On the issue of subsidies, one of the current challenges is that, according to a farmer spokesperson I heard recently speaking on the price of vegetables, the multiples are undercutting the cost for a farmer to actually grow those vegetables. That has to be put into the equation.

To get back to a point I made earlier to the Minister of State, some people have no experience of eating vegetables or fish, for example. I know lots of families who have never eaten fish and do not like it. Their fish is the fish they get in the chipper or wherever. They do not like the taste or smell of it but they have no experience of it. That is the point I am making. How do you bring people on board with the policy without education or giving them that experience? You can subsidise vegetables until they cost nearly nothing but if people are not going to eat them, you are wasting your time.

It is a similar issue when it comes to the pricing of cigarettes. Are people giving them up because of their cost? The price of cigarettes goes up in every budget but smokers are addicted to cigarettes and find it difficult to give them up in spite of campaigns or the pricing. There will always be an element who use cigarettes. There is a role for education, though "education" may not be the right word. It is about giving people the necessary experience. To go back to the issue of young mothers, many of them did not know how to cook and had never been taught how to cook. Their parents might not have been able to cook. I know families who are in that situation. If you go to their local shop, however, you will see two-for-one deals on brown food, as it is called, such as pizza and other processed, instant or microwaveable food. It is a significant challenge, particularly for poor people. If we try to promote products that are more expensive, we will lose the battle, particularly in respect of those who are poor. They do not see any alternative to feed their families.