Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for that, but I could have sent the Minister an email with the questions. I would have thought that the purpose of Topical Issue debates is that we could have a debate on a matter such as this. If the Minister is unavoidably absent, then we accept that. In fairness to the Minister, he is one of the better Cabinet Ministers at attending for Topical Issue debates. I want to put on the record that this whole process needs to be reviewed. I do not believe it is fair on the Minister of State or me to be here at 10 p.m. to have a debate whereby I ask her questions and she then relays them to the Minister.

I will say this, and maybe the Minister of State will take this point back, because I will take the Minister up on that specific offer of questions. Does the Minister see a difficulty in the response, which indicates that the Secretary General of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine has already provided an initial reaction by way of written response to the Commission on the observations? The Commission has seen the Government's response to its observations. We, as elected representatives, have seen the observations. Farmers have seen the observations. However, we have not seen what the Secretary General, on behalf of the people, of farmers and of the agriculture sector, has said. I would have hoped that a topical issues debate, like this one, would have been an opportunity to, rather than just passing on an oversight of what is in the observations and which we can all find out, to hear what the Government has said specifically in respect of those observations.

The crucial question must be asked again: what is the status of this observations? Are they binding? Are we expected? Are we obliged? Will it be a matter for individual governments? How can the assertion be made with such confidence that a final agreement will be reached by the summer break so that the CAP can actually proceed as planned on 1 January next? These are legitimate questions and I hope that the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine will be forthcoming in a public way as soon as possible in answering them.

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