Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Usually, the Minister of State gets to address the Members at the end of the debate on what we have said but because of the way tonight’s debate ran, we have heard his contribution first. He lauded the establishment of this agrifood regulator and he talked about real powers. He did not say what it will have power to do, if anything, he just spoke about real power. It reminded me a little of a time in Irish politics when there was a party which had been in government for a long time and had taken a bit of a hammering. It was kind of down on its luck and out of ideas. The slogan that it ran on was “A real plan”. Do not ask us the detail but we have a real plan. This regulator is a little like that. Yes, it has the power to set up a big office, and it will set up a big office and it will be a drain on an Exchequer and we will get suitably qualified former civil servants from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine - instead of going to work for the food processors they will go in there – but it will have the power to do very little else. We have huge profits being made in the retail sector but the regulator does not have the power to determine where those profits are being made. The processors will say it is not them and they not making any money and the retailers will say the same. They will say you should protest somewhere else because they certainly are not responsible. This regulator will have the same power as an academic in Trinity College Dublin, UCD or anywhere else, that is, just to look at the figures that are already in the public domain. That is absolutely ridiculous. It is a waste of taxpayers' money to establish it as it currently is. It has great potential but you have to give it power. Similarly, it does not have the power to determine what is the minimum cost of production of various food items in Ireland, unlike similar bodies in other European countries. This enabled a multinational retailer to come out recently to state the cost of production of milk has fallen and therefore, it was cutting its price. The cost of production of milk patently has not fallen. Foodstuffs that bovines get have rocketed in cost, as have the green diesel farmers rely on to drive their tractors to harvest etc. and labour. Consequently, the cost of production has not fallen and this regulator will have no power to contradict claptrap like that.

My colleague, Deputy Harkin, talked about this retail forum. I wish it well but I fear what will happen is people will be brought in and it will be used to put pressure on Irish producers and not those making smaller boxes of cornflakes or imported foods. It will not be taking on the big food corporations across the world but instead, it will be used to hammer beef producers who are already barely making a margin over the cost of production and to hammer milk producers or vegetable producers, who are already being displaced by imported vegetables, and people think they are doing the world a favour.

Responses are possible. This regulator could succeed but not without amendments. The amendments have already been declined in this House but I urge the Government to think about them for the Seanad. I do not care who has introduced them but the regulator needs real powers and I specify "powers"; not just a slogan.

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