Andrew Doyle (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

There is no doubt but that this Supplementary Estimate is needed. It will cost the State €180 million because of flaws within the food chain. We must rectify the matter to avoid being exposed to such a situation again. To that end, I compliment Deputy Johnny Brady and the other members of the Committee on Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for agreeing to hold an intensive series of sessions in January to prepare a report with recommendations that I hope will be put to the Dáil before the end of January.

The primary cause of this problem was that the regime of scrutiny, including testing, at the feed supplier end of the cycle was not up to scratch. Even if the premises were being tested only once a year, it should be mandatory to send samples of the product for analysis. It happens with feed compounders and also when milk is collected at the farmyard gate. It should be standard procedure to send samples from batch numbers for analysis, including the testing of dioxin levels.

In addition the sooner our dioxin testing capacity is up and running the better. There has been a cost factor in sending samples to York for tests. I acknowledge that the results came back very quickly in this instance, but such testing facilities should be available here. Samples from companies such as the one that caused this problem should be sent for testing as a matter of course every week.

We heard earlier from Deputy Ned O'Keeffe that in Denmark pork and bacon products are 100% traceable. In reply to parliamentary questions, I have been told by the Minister for Health and Children that such provisions can only be justified here on the grounds of protecting public health, prevention of fraud or unfair competition. All three grounds are applicable in the pig and poultry sectors. We must get serious about this. There has been resistance within the food processing industry to clear traceability, including country of origin and production. It has been convenient for certain elements to ignore traceability and present foreign products as being Irish. We saw that by virtue of the products that remained on shelves recently. In recent weeks, it became a virtue to do so because the products were not Irish. However, the same products were being marketed beforehand as if they were Irish.

We have 51 abattoirs that operate under a scheme whose closing date was 29 February 2008. Various Fine Gael Members tabled questions about this scheme in July, October and this month, but they received the same answer. In the last reply, dated 1 December, we were told that results were expected from the 51 abattoirs shortly. If we had a network of abattoirs that were subject to full scrutiny we would have been able to contain the problem.

If this problem is properly rectified it should not recur. If it were to recur, however, we should be able to isolate and contain it and thus minimise the financial damage to our industry.

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