Paul Connaughton (Galway East, Fine Gael)
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As I said, I come from a farming background. After a TB test, the vet returns after four days. The animal may have a high reading and the lumps are there. My experience of this a number of years ago was the vet said there was a problem and within a couple of days somebody came to destroy the animal. The story we got in some of these cases was this procedure was not followed and there was a heavy-handed approach with lads piling in on top of cattle and farms within hours. I am trying to distinguish between what the witnesses were told and how the process started. What I have just explained happens on many farms throughout the country because of TB and brucellosis. Unfortunately, it is a daily occurrence. At what point did the Department make the decision in one or two of these cases that there was much more going on and that it had to get in much quicker?