Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister gave a very comprehensive reply but, unfortunately, I disagree completely with what he said. In fact, the Minister has reneged on his responsibility to Irish dairy farmers. He has allowed the Commission to set the precedent of taking away the floor price from milk. In 2016 only for the fact that all the product that was going into intervention was bought at a fixed price, milk prices would have gone into the middle teens or below that. The Minister has now allowed the Commission to operate a tendering system for the purchase of skimmed milk powder, which means in essence there is no floor under milk prices in 2018.

In 2017 the price of skimmed milk powder never went above the intervention price. In fact, a lot of product was sold by Irish processors under the intervention price rather than put the product into storage. The Minister has now given the Commission a weapon in that it can buy skimmed milk powder at whatever price it wishes, going forward. That is a hugely dangerous precedent to set. I accept there is a lot of skimmed milk powder in intervention and the reports we hear are that the Commission is prepared to sell that at a very low price. The Minister has now given it the weapon to purchase product for intervention at a low price as well. He has fundamentally changed the rules by which price supports operated. It was written in stone that 109,000 tonnes could be purchased each marketing year at a fixed price. The Minister has allowed the Commission to move away from that and it is incorrect for him to say he is not setting a precedent. He cannot expect Irish dairy farmers to accept that because it is unacceptable. We had set a precedent and we have now allowed the Commission to take away the floor price for dairy products.

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