Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the motion which I support fully. We talk about money. I tabled a question to the Department of Finance to ask what was given back by agriculture in 2015, 2016 and 2017. The Department replied that after taking account of capital carryover in the following year, the surplus to be surrendered to the Exchequer in 2015 was €57 million and in 2016 it was €231 million.

The reality is that 70% of the suckler herd is from Donegal down to Clare and out to Longford. The reason we are losing cattle numbers is that when one goes to the mart to sell a weanling, the price is not there. The cow is costing too much. Unless we put a floor under the price, we are going nowhere. There was talk about beef genomics. I heard Deputy Penrose discuss it. For the export market and to get cattle to Turkey or wherever, we must have the Benson & Hedges coloured Charolais because that is what will make the money. One has to get €850 to €1,000 for a weanling or one is going nowhere with the suckler herd. We have to put a floor under the price.

In 2015, there were 40,000 herds with fewer than 12 cows. These are family farms. When CAP came out, they got shafted because 80% of the money went to 20% of the farmers. These farmers are not going into it. One looks at the statistics for the current year and has to ask why we have killed 10,000 more cattle but the tonnage was the same. It is because we are rearing narrow-arsed cattle that will not pull down the scale.

Whether people like to admit that, it is the reality. There is a question mark over some of the beef genomics at the moment because of the star rating. They are looking again at this because some bulls produced four or five calves and some produced 100 calves, but the ones that produced four or five had the higher star rating. We need to get realistic and produce the product that is required. Whether we like it or not, the farmer has to have an animal that will pull the scales down or have the shape for export. They are continental cattle. If we keep going the way we are going, we will drive the farmer out. From Donegal down along the west coast right down to Kerry and out as far as Longford - that is where the nucleus is of farmers. We have to protect them with money. That is what came back to me from the Department of Finance. It is not me saying it: I can give that reply to anybody any day.

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