Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party)
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136. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine his views regarding the possible future effects on the reputation of Irish beef, arising from the involvement of a company (details supplied), as the first major distributor of Irish beef in America. [6680/15]

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party)
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Do the Minister and his Department have concerns about possible future effects on the reputation of Irish beef arising from the involvement of Larry Goodman's company, ABP Food Group, as the first major distributor of Irish beef in America?

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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While obviously I welcome all questions here, the Deputy is trying to infer something I do not think is relevant or exists. First, we were in the United States last week and visited New York, Washington and Boston over three days. Practically the entire beef industry was out there and it was not just ABP Foods but also was Kepak, Dawn Meats, Slaney Meats, Foyle Food Group and multiple others. They all were doing deals, which is what they were there for, namely, to meet potential customers. For the first time in 16 years, Ireland is able to sell a high-quality premium product into the largest beef market in the world. In total, 11 million tonnes of beef are consumed in the United States each year. The average American eats twice the volume of beef eaten by the average European each year. ABP Food Group is the largest beef processor in Ireland and Britain and from my experience, it runs a pretty good show. It has modern plants, kills a lot of cattle and it is not a surprise that the largest beef processor in Ireland was putting together a partnership with the largest food distributor in the United States, Sysco Corporation. Incidentally, that is a fantastic company which, a number of years ago, partnered and acquired Pallas Foods and there are great people involved in that company, many of whom are Irish. This partnership should be worth approximately €15 million per year in terms of purchasing Irish beef and is a highly positive news story. I will not allow and have not allowed personalities or history with regard to names, companies or anything to get in the way of what is a positive story for the food industry. ABP Food Group did a great job last week and Paul Finnerty was out there. The other big companies also did a great job last week. It was a universally positive three days in both of those big Irish cities in the United States. In my view, it will help to put positive momentum into beef prices in Ireland as one moves into the rest of the year and what has been raised here is something of a distraction.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party)
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No, I share in the view that it is welcome that Irish beef exporters can export to the United States. However, the question is whether it is in no way problematic that at present, regardless of whether one likes it, the face of those exports is a man who was in charge of a company that previously was found by a tribunal to have been repackaging meat, meat by-products and offal from all over the world as Irish. Is this not problematic? I draw no inferences that are not there. It is the case that as Minister, Deputy Coveney welcomed the deal, which is the biggest of all the deals that were done. One can think back to 1987, when a previous major deal concluded by this man and his company was welcomed by the Government. Obviously, that turned out to be a disaster in respect of export credit insurance taken on by the taxpayer and the cost of that then landing on the taxpayer.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Let me reassure people on this issue. I can only speak for myself as Minister over nearly four years. My Department keeps tight regulatory responsibility with all the beef companies in Ireland. No animal is killed in Ireland without being supervised by someone from my Department, most of them being vets, and this goes for ABP Food Group, as well as all the others. Ireland exports beef to 45 different countries and all the big players are involved in that export story. Were one to refer to the distant past on a regular basis and make inferences from that-----

Tom Hayes (Tipperary South, Fine Gael)
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We would do nothing.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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-----I am unsure what purpose that would serve. Personally, I have little or no relationship with the individual to whom the Deputy has referred and I certainly am not going to start speaking about any individual in this House.

My job is to ensure companies processing beef in Ireland do it properly and safely to a high standard. That has been my experience of all the companies with us last week in the United States. We have only approved two plants to export beef to United States. Very soon there will be a third and, over the next several months, many other plants will go through the approval process. I am comfortable and confident that all the companies exporting beef to the United States will be able to maintain the hard-earned reputation of the beef business of high quality.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party)
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The Minister used the phrase the distant past but one does not have to go back to 1987 to find questionable practices happening in a plant owned by this company. Two years ago, it was implicated in the horsemeat scandal. It should be recognised that the man in question was previously at the centre of a nexus relationship between agribusiness and politicians. If one reads the beef tribunal report, it pops up again and again about this man meeting Charlie Haughey in his home. Do these people have influence? The beef industry, as detailed by Deputy Pat Rabbitte in this House several years ago, made significant donations to the major establishment parties such as Fianna Fáil-----

Michael Kitt (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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Will the Deputy be careful with what he is saying? I have no issue about him naming the person as it is in the public domain. However, any suggestions or allegations of wrongdoing against a person outside of the House are not in order.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party)
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I am not making any new allegations about anybody. These are known facts. It is also a known fact that this man is now the biggest beef exporter to the US but the Minister does not have a problem with this. He does not believe this could cause damage to other beef exporters who do not have murky questions over their previous business practices, not just in the distant past but more recently.

Tom Hayes (Tipperary South, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy should look in the mirror.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party)
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Why? I do not export beef or horsemeat for that matter.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I am not going to get into making judgments on issues that were subjects of tribunals in the past as I do not believe it is helpful. As I said, I am very comfortable that we have regulatory systems that allow us to produce the safest and highest quality beef in the planet. It is not just me saying that. We are the only European country allowed to export beef to the United States because of those standards. It is also because of the results of inspection visits by United States authorities last summer of several ABP plants, which were excellent.

My job is to ensure when we are exporting beef all over the world that we are doing it in a way that is safe and that I can stand over its transparency, traceability, sustainability, quality and safety. All the companies with us last week in the United States comply with the regulations in full. In many ways, they are offering leadership with new projects, particularly around sustainability and animal welfare. Deputy Maureen O’Sullivan might be interested on that last point. For that reason, companies like Sysco are happy to develop partnerships with large Irish beef companies. This will allow us build business that will ensure farmers get a better price for their produce and build increased employment in the beef industry based on export markets like the United States.