Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the delegation from the Irish Charolais Cattle Society here today. I thank Mr. McKiernan for his comprehensive statement, which contained a serious amount of questions.

I wish to declare that I am a dairy and beef farmer. I strongly believe there is no need for confrontation between these two sectors of the industry. At present, cows in the dairy herd make €3.75 a kilo, which shows there is a market for them. They are sold under a quality assurance banner and the meat factories actively tout for farmers to sell them their cows. Mr. McKiernan, in his presentation, has insinuated that the beef coming out of the dairy herd has questions marks over it. Such a claim detracts from the very substantial points that were made in the society's presentation. Mr. McKiernan has made a lot of very relevant points but confronting and questioning the source of more than 50% of our beef supply is, in my view, definitely not the road to take. Leaving that to one side, many relevant questions have been asked and I believe they need to be answered. We can put those questions to the delegation from the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation when we meet them later today.

Mr. McKiernan asked why cross-bred bulls are being allowed to join the beef data genomics programme. I would like to hear the view of the ICCS delegation as to why that decision was made. I fully agree that it is illogical for replacements coming from the dairy herd to be given a rating as high as four-stars or five-stars on the genotype yet progeny from a good suckler dam is not given anywhere near the same rating. I am baffled as to why that is the case and believe the situation should be rectified. My brother-in-law is a suckler farmer so I am familiar with the industry.

Mr. McKiernan gave a second example of how the rating for a sire dropped on the replacement index thus reducing its value. Please explain why that happened. Was the rating based on fertility? Was it based on kill-out? Please outline the reasons for such a huge drop in the rating.

Mr. McKiernan outlined another example that I do not think was included in the presentation circulated to members. I refer to a case where the rating dropped very substantially. Can he explain the reason for the drop?

Mr. McKiernan raised questions on the board of the ICBF and made it clear that his society is unhappy with its decisions. He also questioned the composition of the ICBF board. There was an election for the AI stations lately and I noted that the representative from my local AI station lost out. What kind of voting pattern caused that to happen? Mr. McKiernan has claimed that one AI company has a six-member representation on the board of ICBF and, to me, that seems extremely undemocratic and unfair. South Eastern Cattle Breeding Society Limited is an company that provides AI and is located close to me. I know that the chief executive of the company was on the board of the ICBF up to a month or six weeks ago but he lost out in the last round of elections. Mr. McKiernan should please explain the voting structure. I fully agree with Mr. McKiernan that having one representative of the breed societies yet six directors from AI stations on the board would make a board extremely unbalanced. The farmers' representations on the board come from a cross-section of different farmers. One would hope and strongly believe that they would represent the views of their membership, which would be a cross-view.

Mr. McKiernan asked a serious amount of questions on behalf of his organisation. I presume that ICBF will try to answer them in the next session today.

The nub of this issue is the beef data genomics programme. The way that animals are graded in the replacements index seems unfair. Can the ICCS delegation recommend changes that would rectify the situation? Can they explain how the decision about the stock bull was reached in the first place?

In terms of the decline in the quality of beef cattle and the grading system, the drop in the number of suckler cows must be factored into the change in grades. Mr. McKiernan has said that mart managers can attest to the fact that the quality of animals from suckler herds has dropped significantly. Does the ICCS blame that on the maternal traits identified in the beef data genomics programme? Has the quality of the chosen paternal animal and dam contributed to the drop in grades?

That concludes my observations. I reiterate that conflict between two sectors in the industry does not benefit anyone.