Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister is encouraging farmers to listen to their agricultural advisers and primarily use grain-based concentrates. That is the policy advice to deal with the fodder crisis and what farmers should do. They should listen to professional advice, but the Minister has decided to take a different approach. He has decided to bring forward a subsidy to transport silage and hay from the other end of the country, which is not what the professionals are advising. He has decided not to operate that scheme alongside a meal voucher scheme, which is the response advised. Instead, he has decided to do it on a stand-alone basis. If farmers go down the route of availing of the Minister's subsidy, it will lead to increased demand for an already exceptionally scarce fodder resource. It will take farmers away from the professional advice, which is to deal with the fodder crisis through the use of additional grain concentrates. The Minister is not following his own advice. He is telling farmers to do what he says but not what he does. It defies logic.

The Minister is also making the process so obscure that it is exceptionally difficult for anyone to engage with it. Despite this, he is somehow able to say he might do something about the problem. If his scheme was to work, it would be counterproductive.

See this speech in context