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

The protection of farmers income is written into the programme for Government. The Tánaiste is the very man who back in 2013 advised dairy farmers to increase production. As he knows, at most 20% of calves are kept for replacement. The rest of the dairy bred calves go into beef production. At that time, the Tánaiste told people to increase production and now the Government is advising beef farmers to reduce production and plant forestry. At the same time, the Government will allow Brazilians to import beef into the European Union. How can the Government reconcile this? How can it explain to farmers that four or five years ago it told them to increase production and now it is telling them to decrease production? It is not as simple as turning on or off a tap.

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