Michelle Mulherin (Fine Gael)
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The case for electronic identification of sheep has been well made. The bottom line, however, is that farmers have been asked to pay and are not happy about it. All farmers have had a tough year, particularly in the sheep sector, which, as colleagues have said, is not one of the high profit farming sectors. Sheep farmers where I am from always face issues and problems, including viability. Someone from Meat Industry Ireland said the whole sheep sector will benefit. I think it was Mr. Carroll. While I accept that, there is only one pillar of the industry being asked to pay along with the taxpayer the €50 being proposed. Some members of the committee were in Brussels to hear about issues around the weak position of farmers in the food supply chain and about how they are always an easy target. They have little bargaining power and, in a case like this, the costs fall to be borne by them. Is that correct? Is the meat industry paying towards this in some way? It is all very well to herald the measure and tell us it is much needed, but farming is all about margins. Something either helps or goes against those margins, whether it is fertiliser or commodity prices. Farmers are making a fair point about who is carrying the cost here.

An underspend of approximately €5 million has been identified at a time when a cost of €50 per farmer has been proposed.

We are all for the modernisation of all sectors and we want to have the best agriculture and be the best food producers in the world but we have to support the primary producers. Some of the sheep farmers I meet tell me they cannot see the next generation taking up the mantle and carrying on with sheep farming. It is the same with suckler cows. This will be a serious issue. Until now people have carried on through family tradition but young people, thankfully, have many more options available to them through education and training and farming is not a very attractive prospect. If we keep hammering farmers bit by bit, at some stage we will have the straw that breaks the camel's back. We are told by the Government and the Commissioner that everything is being done to help farmers but this is a backward step. It might not be the biggest step ever but it has a cumulative effect.