Mr. Tom?s Bourke:

What I am talking about is the controls. If a cull cow is being sold onwards to a controlled finishing unit, she will not be tested. If she goes into a farm that is not a controlled finishing unit but which is for finishing, there will be no major impact on that farm for 90 days, three months. It will be three months before herd testing is required.

If at any time during that 90-day period that animal is slaughtered or tested, you are back to normal. This is effectively focusing on breeding cows. Cows that a farmer would be buying to maintain the herd for breeding for a period of time will require a test, which could be done on the farm on which they arrive. However, the most likely scenario is that the market will react to this and farmers selling cows for breeding will have a pre-movement test. If we look at where TB reactors are likely to be found, this is the only reasonable place to apply this criterion because those cows account for more than 60% of our TB reactors.

While none of us like this, it is an example of some reasonable compromise being reached, through the implementation group, to effectively minimise the impact on trade and competition so that marts and farmers are not disenfranchised and, critically, the cull cow trade is not impacted. If I do not want to deal with the factory or feed on that cow for the last two or three months, I can sell her on in the mart, like I did this year, after February of the following year without any impediment. The stumbling block is who pays for it. The Deputy is aware of what we proposed in our submission and I hope the committee puts it to the Department.

The Deputy asked about the ceilings in the live valuation scheme. That issue is being dealt with through the technical working group. Those ceilings have to be increased. As to where that issue rests, no agreement has been reached but there has to be an increase in the ceilings. It is a live valuation scheme and the ceilings should reflect the open market. That is the starting position on it.

On the hardship grant, which the Deputy has correctly identified as a hardship grant, the off-farm income impediment is a key demand and I anticipate it will be provided for in the enhancements that are being discussed. This, along with the income supplement and depopulation grant, is where farmers are being asked to contribute if there is additional expenditure retrospectively. Given that farmers are being facilitated with purchasing into restricted farms and the likelihood that the majority of farmers, or a significant number of them, will replace their animals, there could be a reduced expenditure in those income supplement and hardship grant schemes.

The Deputy's final point was on deer and I will ask our vice chair, Ms Mooney, to comment on that from a Wicklow perspective and to address Coillte's proposals.