Mr. Seán O'Leary:

To return to the point that the Chairman made - I see it in the recommendations from the report - on the funding of an insurance-type product, what one would say is that anything that might be introduced would have to be done voluntarily at a farmer level. Some people might say at times that farmers need to be protected from themselves but I would reject that. There were one or two funds introduced by some processors last year and that was used to support milk prices in recent times. If some products or initiatives are introduced by processors, the important thing is that there is a transparent system, that farmers see that if money is there and is not being passed onto them directly, that it is put into an alternative fund and that it is transparent and does not reflect back on base milk price. It is a question that some farmers are asking of their processors - the fund is put in place but is it then being used to subsidise a lower base milk price? There is not the same situation in dairying as there is in beef with regard to farmers and processors but I think whatever systems will be put in place in future will have to be voluntary and transparent. With the structure of farm ownership that we have in the industry it should be possible with whatever initiatives take place but the voluntary part has to be borne in mind.