Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am disappointed that the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine is not here to hear what we are highlighting after days of incessant rain in Kerry, including yesterday and the days beforehand. The ground has gone so wet now.

I heard the Taoiseach saying that the weather was picking up. The Taoiseach may be involved in some way in the weather forecasting and maybe he knows more than I do, but the fact is that if it dried today it would take two to three weeks before land would dry so that a farmer could leave cattle out.

Cattle are hungry. Cows are hungry. Lambs are perishing. Farmers' minds are being tested to the limit.

Will the Taoiseach and his Government subsidise meals and rations and give farmers some sort of subsidy? As Deputy Michael Collins said, this has been going on since last fall. By November, farmers had used half their fodder.

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