Thomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent)
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Everything has, more or less, been said. I wonder about the increases proposed in the payment under CAP. How are we going to stop the beef factories? The prices will not improve in the factories so what is the point of it? Is it solely that the Government or EU is agreeing the payment so that beef factories will continue to keep prices down? That is the reality of the situation and I do not know how one gets around it or what one does around it, but we have to find something different in relation to it. Deputy Penrose mentioned some possible solutions. Alternatives could include farmers putting some of their land into forestry to get a premium for that. That is over and above and not directly related to suckler cows and would allow them to increase their incomes. Bizarrely, it would go some way to meeting the carbon reduction requirements also. Factories are going to capitalise on whatever farmers get and we may simply have to put up our hands and acknowledge that is the way it is going to be. For every €100 from CAP or the Government, the same amount will drop in the factories and that is fair enough and we will have to live with it. If that is the case, we should be saying so. I do not know how we get around it.

We must also look at the suckler versus the dairy herd.

Everybody says the dairy herd is causing the problems for the suckler sector now or that the suckler herd is responsible for the extra carbon, or that we are making money out of the dairy herd of whatever. All this has to be thought out and must not be considered in isolation. It is a very difficult problem and I do not know how a solution can be found, as is evident from the contributions of the members today. It will be interesting to see how it develops. I am interested in hearing whether the delegates have ideas on how any increase from the Government might not result in a reduction in the factories. The impact it will have has been outlined here. We will be back here next year raising the same issue and there will still not be any positive outcome, unfortunately.