Ms Patricia King:

The worrying issue is the point I made to Deputy Calleary, namely, that state aid rules debar. My point, however, is that we are in unparalleled and unprecedented circumstances. We cannot sacrifice parts of the economy because rules are in place. It does not really matter what happens to the poor devil I described with his 50 head of cattle. He can be told to diversify into forestry but he does not have the wherewithal to do so. For this reason, as I argued to the employer at the Carrick-on-Shannon meeting, there is no point telling the farmer to move to planting trees. While it is a very good idea to diversify, people must be given a pathway to enable them to do so.