Mr. Bill Callanan:

I have no evidence of that but in terms of the engagement of farmers with banding last year, 92% of them engaged online. It is lower this year at approximately 82% and the Department will write to farmers who have not declared a band. However, I do not have any evidence to suggest there is a management of output downwards. We have looked at the production curve and who is sitting into the various bands and it is quite uniform. It is like any typical bell-shaped curve. It is natural somebody who is very close to the edge might turn around and ask how they will manage their output. For that, it would be expected in a dairy herd production to happen at the end of the lactation where somebody would say, "I want to cut production here. I will manage it." What we are seeing all springtime, which would not be in line with a suggestion of what the Senator said about banding, is that output has been reduced every month. It is down consistently which is not in line with the suggestion farmers are managing the output in line with the band. We can certainly look at it over time.