Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I have spoken to them about this and we have made it clear why we made the changes we did. We had good reason to do that. There was concern that there would be a significant reduction in the number of rendering facilities which would not have been good for Ireland particularly if that location was not even in the State. Of course we want competition but we also want to ensure there are plenty of players in the system so that if we had a significant outbreak, we would have multiple options in terms of rendering facilities. We introduced the distance limits primarily for biosecurity reasons, but we ensured that within that every farmer would have at least two options in terms of competition on price. If there is evidence that that competition is not functioning and the opposite is happening, we need to review that. I have sent a very clear signal to the organisations concerned that it is not acceptable to have a significant price increase as a result of the changes here. We will review it unless that changes.

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