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

I welcome the opportunity to participate in this debate. As the Minister will know, we have engaged extensively with him on these matters since probably before the last General Election when we debated the need to protect, in the first instance, primary producers, as well as consumers, from what is an ongoing difficulty with our food supply chain. That difficulty arises from that fact that when we are talking about Irish food, there is lots of money to be made, particularly in the beef sector. The difficulty traditionally has been that the people who have been making that money are not the primary producers. They are largely the processors and the retailers. The difficulty has been - this is acknowledged across the House - that there is a big lack of transparency. We clearly know how much farmers get for their product because what farmers receive either at the mart or the factory is published on a weekly basis. We know how much consumers pay for their product, and we know how much more consumers have been paying for their product over the past number of months in particular. There is a problem and we need to figure out the best mechanisms by which to be able to address that. Between the farmer who is selling the product and the consumer purchasing the product, there is absolute darkness in terms of transparency, to such an extent that processors have claimed before an Oireachtas committee that they do not make any money. One would think they are almost doing it as a charitable enterprise. Retailers argue the same.

We know there is a problem from looking at the fact that the major meat producers in this country operate as unlimited companies. Establishing a company with an unlimited structure is very risky, particularly if there is any risk to one's profits. This means that the owners become directly liable for any losses that might be incurred. Therefore, for anybody to establish a company under those circumstances he or she must first be strongly confident about making a profit into the future.

The real reason, however, that any company would establish itself on an unlimited basis relates precisely to the fact it would not have to produce profit reports annually. That is why our meat industry operates as unlimited companies and it is also why it operates in this convoluted corporate structure that, in some cases, takes in four different states to hide beneficial ownership and so on.

I welcome the fact we are debating Report Stage of the Bill and I welcome the Minister's adopting of many of the proposals that have been put forward during this process, not least at the pre-legislative scrutiny stage, given it was widely accepted at a meeting of the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine that the heads of the Bill were nowhere near what was necessary. Likewise, I welcome the fact that on Committee Stage, too, the Minister accepted a number of the amendments put forward by me and other Opposition Deputies. Even so, the truth is the Bill still does not have the type of teeth the regulator will be required to have if it is to mark the sea change we believe, and the Minister has said, is required to ensure there will be open transparency and full sight of the profits being made and secured by some elements of the chain, as distinct from those who produce, primarily, and those who purchase in supermarkets.

It is crucial, therefore, that the Minister revisit some of the amendments. Some of the most important amendments that were put forward were ruled out of order because the Opposition cannot table those sorts of amendments, but the Minister can and there will be an opportunity to do so in the Seanad. Sinn Féin is of the view that while the Bill is progress in the right direction, there will be a need, if the Minister does not take up the mantle now, for a future Government to provide the regulator with the type of teeth that will allow it to regulate and be a strong voice and champion for our primary producers and consumers.

I thank the departmental officials and the Minister for his engagement on this legislation, but I urge them to go forward. As he may know, I have lost my job and am no longer my party's spokesperson on agriculture and rural development. It is never a nice feeling to be replaced by someone who is better than you but I have been, and I am sure the Minister will learn what that feels like after the next election because he, too, might be replaced by the same individual. I will leave it at that for now.

See this speech in context