Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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If a family had a horse that was a pet to the family, in the past they would bring out the local vet and he would put it down in a humane way. That is not allowed now. They would have buried that horse and treated it as if it was a human. That is the way they felt about the animal. The Department's policy, and in particular Mr. Sheahan's section, over the past number of years has been to close down cattle slaughterhouses and abattoirs all over the country. What happened is, and I saw it in my own county, a number of abattoirs were working very well, were well run and well inspected but inspector after inspector came in time after time and all they wanted was to get them out of there and get the big guys operating. We have the big guys operating now and by God, they are not doing too well.