Mr. Pat McCormack:

As I alluded to earlier, it is critical that we know what is happening in the supply chain between the farmyard and the shop shelf. Published figures will be inadequate.

We need this office to have the ability and power to go in and examine exactly what is happening along the food chain. My farmers, Mr. Cullinan’s farmers or any other farmer who will come in here in the next four or five hours to address the committee is open to scrutiny. Equally, that level of scrutiny needs to be right along the food chain. A few different things that affect our ability as a nation. I once heard us described as a food-producing island. A few factors can affect that going forward, including the margin for the primary producer and the climate Bill. If Government goes beyond 22% in its target for emissions reduction, we will be in a huge red zone as regards closing the farm gates. Equally, we need transparency along the food chain. I do not like to use the word “middlemen”, but there are people with significant margins between the shelf and the farmyard and that needs to be exposed.

My colleague, Mr. Enright, will go into the governance issues.