Mr. Tim Cullinan:

If I may come in for a second on what Ms Brennan just said about the new food regulator, Niamh Lenehan, it is absolutely astounding that this lady has been in office for a number of months now but that her office is still not functioning. It is an absolute disgrace. We had food deflation of 9% over ten years but this year is the first year in which we have seen a small amount of food inflation, 6% or 7%. We all know where the costs were. There was inflation of 160% or 170% on fertiliser earlier this year. Like all other farmers, it is at the start of the year that horticulture farmers plant their crops. For there to be a food regulator who is not actually functioning at this point is nothing short of a disgrace.

There is a very important point regarding this new strategy, which Ms Brennan has referred to. We have Bord Bia, the Department and Teagasc working in conjunction with us but, even with this voluntary charter, we need the retailers to come on board. When there are only 100 of these farmers left in the country, something needs to be done to ensure that anyone going out to plant a crop will get a margin on top of the cost of production. Even if we got nothing else out of this evening's meeting, we would like the committee to take that issue further with the Minister to ensure the food regulator gets up and running and engages on this voluntary charter to ensure that retailers pass a margin back to the primary producers.