Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

Deputy McConalogue will today become the fourth Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine in four months and nothing sums up the dumpster fire that is this Government as succinctly as the revolving door at the Department. It goes around, bringing in a new Minister each month. We started lockdown with the former Minister, Deputy Creed, who rushed to the defence of the meat plant owners, ignoring the pleas of the workers and the left for factory inspections. His legacy is the outbreak of Covid-19 in these plants.

We then had Deputy Cowen in the role. His attempt to break the record for shortest term as a Minister was clearly seen as a challenge to be bested by his successor, Deputy Calleary, who told us Covid-19 loves to party before proceeding to demonstrate this by joining the golf society in Clifden. What unites all these tales of fallen Ministers is the arrogance of the golden circle in Irish society, including people from the political, judicial and economic spheres. These people view themselves as being above the rules and functioned as the protectors of the beef barons and the rich.

Again and again, Minister after Minister defended and protected meat plant bosses. Back in April, the then Minister, Deputy Creed, refused to listen to warnings about conditions in the plants. He accused me of smearing the companies for raising these points. There have since been 1,500 cases of Covid-19 in meat plants. These are 1,500 cases of workers who caught this virus because the Government turned a blind eye to what was going on. How many of them have or will suffer long-term effects from Covid-19? Will workers die as a result of contracting Covid-19 in meat plants?

The new Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine must stand up to the beef barons. Even to this day, meat factory owners are refusing to provide proper sick pay for workers. We need proper sick pay for all workers so that if they feel unwell they do not feel compelled to go into work. This means following the example of Germany and banning the use of subcontractors and bogus self-employment in the meat plants to stop bosses from getting out of providing workers with the rights to which they are entitled. The trade unions must be allowed full access to the plants to organise the workers. The beef barons have shown that they cannot be trusted to run these plants. Instead, we need elected workplace health and safety committees. They should be the ones to run the factories. Worker control is the only way to ensure that corners are not cut and workers' lives are not put in danger by billionaires like Mr. Larry Goodman.

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