Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

This is not the first, the second or perhaps the third time Members have stood in the Chamber to request the Minister to take action on this fodder crisis. We have a national fodder crisis that has escalated day by day causing untold stress and strain on farmers, their families and entire rural communities nationwide. The Minister has sat on his hands on this issue with his head in the sand. As he well knows, Deputies McConalogue and Cahill and I, as well as many others in this House have repeatedly requested that he act on this issue but he has failed to listen to us, which means he has failed the farmers who are at the coalface of this issue. He could have acknowledged this was a growing crisis months ago. He could have advised farmers to rationalise their fodder. He could have prepared a contingency plan and introduced a meal voucher scheme for the farmers affected. He could have put extra resources in place to ensure the outstanding 2017 GLAS and sheep welfare payments were made available to alleviate the financial pressures on farmers but he did not. The one scheme designed to alleviate the problem was the Government's transport subsidy scheme which has been a complete failure with only 16 applications to date.

Farmers need swift action and by action I mean the putting in place of practical measures such as the provision of funding and financial assistance in terms of the meal voucher scheme. The Minister must acknowledge that the transport subsidy scheme has had the reverse effect and increased the price of fodder to four, or perhaps five, times the actual price, as was acknowledged here. We need a fodder action group to be set up. As the Minister is aware, this is the second time farmers have been affected by this issue in the past five years. We must take cognisance of that, act on it and not ignore a national crisis.

See this speech in context