Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Tá costais mhaireachtála agus costais bhia, chíos, chairr, fhuinneamh, theas agus chúram leanaí ag ardú. Tá muintir na tíre seo, gnáth teaghlaigh agus oibrithe, ag streachailt. Níl go leor sa €100 a tugadh do dhaoine le dul in éadan costais leictreachais. Tá an ghéarchéim i bhfad níos leithne ná sin agus caithfidh an Rialtas é sin a thuiscint. Tá moltaí curtha chun tosaigh ag Sinn Féin chun dul i ngleic leis an ngéarchéim seo, na costais a laghdú agus cuidiú le daoine. Tá sé seo ina chúis imní do a lán daoine anois. Caithfidh an Rialtas réitithe réadúla agus uaillmhianacha a chur i gcríoch agus caithfear gnáthdhaoine a chosaint agus cuidiú a thabhairt dóibh, mar atá de cheart acu.

The Irish people faced a cost-of-living crisis. There is absolutely no doubt about that. In the 12 months to December, inflation reached the highest levels in 20 years. Rents are spiralling out of control as a result of the Government's housing plan. Childcare costs amount to a second mortgage for many families. Putting food on the table and running your car has never been more expensive. Energy prices rose by 27% and the cost of home-heating oil has soared by 53%. Prices will continue to rise, with workers and families under pressure like never before.

The Government has had months to deal with the cost-of-living crisis but it failed to come up with a comprehensive plan to support these households. Instead the Government is trading sound bites with leaks from parliamentary party meetings rather than real and immediate action. The Irish people deserve a Government that understands the difficulties that they are facing, not a Government that ignores, delays or, indeed, even makes things worse in some cases. The time to act is long overdue.

Not all households will feel the cost-of-living crisis equally. We know from the CSO that the poorest households spend three times more of their income on heating and lighting their homes than the richest households, and that those in the middle spend twice as much as those at the higher end.

For months, Sinn Féin has been raising the issues of the cost of living with the Tánaiste, with the Government and with the Taoiseach, and we have been bringing forward proposals that the Government has rejected over and over again. Since September, before the budget, we told the Government that what was needed was a €10 increase in core social welfare rates to protect those most in need of support. What the Government provided did not even keep up with price increases and, therefore, it is a de facto cut. These families will be poorer this year than they were last year. We must see an additional €5 increase in these core rates to prevent families and children from being worse off this year than they were last year. We in Sinn Féin have called for an extension of the fuel allowance season by two weeks and for the eligibility criteria to be expanded so that more people can avail of the fuel allowance. The Government has also refused to deal with this.

The Government needs to halt its plans. It is just crazy that, within three months, the Government plans to increase the cost of home-heating oil and gas by heaping on another carbon tax on those commodities despite the fact that home-heating oil has increased by 53% in the past year and energy prices are up by 27%. The Government needs to stop that increase that is about to take effect on 1 May.

We have called for a refundable tax credit equivalent to one month's rent putting up to €1,500 back in renters' pockets to deal with the fact that rents are out of control - rising by over 8% - and we need to ban rent increases for the next three years. That is some of the action that is required.

These are some of the measures that the Tánaiste and the Government could take to deal with the cost-of-living crisis. Far from trading soundbites at the Tánaiste's parliamentary party meetings and selective leaks, let us deal and get on with the job that Deputy Varadkar was elected to do. Let us govern. Let us make sure that people are protected.

Does the Tánaiste plan to take any meaningful action in relation to this situation rather than issue soundbites? It is time for Government to do its job to protect workers and families from being fleeced.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy for raising this very important issue again today in the House. The Government acknowledges that the cost of living is rising. It is rising very fast at present, faster than it has in 20 or 30 years, and people are feeling the squeeze. Whether it is the shock of looking at your gas bill, whether it is the electricity bill or whether it is the rising cost of filling a tank of diesel or petrol, everyone is feeling it in their pocket and, of course, those on lowest incomes are feeling it more so than those who are not. The Government gets that. We have already taken action, much of which was opposed by Deputy Pearse Doherty's party, and some of which was not.

We acknowledge, though, that the action that we have taken to help families with the cost of living is not enough and for that reason, the three party leaders, when we met on Monday night, commissioned line Ministers to develop proposals for a package of measures that will allow us to help families with the cost of living. That is being worked on at present, with further discussions on it today. I am meeting with the unions and employers this afternoon and there will be a chance to discuss it then. There will be a committee meeting of the economic Cabinet committee which I chair next week which will provide another chance to discuss it as well. We will make a decision on it soon, certainly in the next couple of weeks, because we acknowledge that the cost of living is rising, that it is causing a huge squeeze for many families and that as a Government we have to do something about it. We are aware that other Governments in other parts of the world have taken action too and we believe we must do so as well.

In terms of the context, it is important to bear in mind that when the budget was prepared in September and October last, the estimates for inflation were somewhere between 2% and 3% and we built the budget on that basis. However, that has not been the case. It turns out that inflation has been much higher. It is in and around 5%, and rather than being a temporary phenomenon, while it might moderate, it looks like we may be stuck with high inflation for a longer period than we would have anticipated. When the facts change you need to adjust your policies and that is what we intend to do.

Back as far as last March, I was talking about the possibility of inflation. As far back as last June, I was strongly advocating for a personal tax package, welfare increases and pension increases in the budget, and we achieved that. That was done. Perhaps it was not adequate but it was done. Let us not forget that Deputy Pearse Doherty's party opposed the reductions in personal taxation. I advocated reductions in personal taxation to make sure that people getting a pay increase got to keep it because people earning over €38,000 who get a pay increase lose half of it in income tax. I wanted to make sure that people getting a pay increase - thankfully, most people will get a pay increase this year - got to hold onto it. The Deputy did not want that. I also wanted to make sure that those workers who do not get a pay increase - Deputy Pearse Doherty might not realise this but there some workers who will not get a pay increase this year because their employer will not or cannot provide it - would get something and the Deputy opposed that too.

Sinn Féin needs to be honest about its positions as a party. It might be the case that the Deputy objects to increases in carbon tax because of climate scepticism etc. but he also objects to reductions in personal taxation. The truth is, when it comes to after-tax income, significant numbers of middle-income people in the State would be worse off if Sinn Féin's budget had been introduced rather than ours. That is a fact. We acknowledge that things have changed since then, the cost of living has increased by more than anticipated and we need to act on that. We are working on those proposals now.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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The cost-of-living crisis did not just fall from the sky overnight. It has been here with us for many months. We have been raising that with the Government. Indeed, we raised that with the Government before the budget. The Government failed to protect adequately those social welfare recipients who pay three times more on energy costs than the wealthiest in the State.

As a result, under the package for which the budget has been approved, they are going to be poorer by hundreds of euro this year than they were last year. We have a proposal on the way to do this, which is to insulate them from the cost-of-living crisis by increasing core social welfare payments by 5%. The Government plans to increase the cost of oil and gas for households on 1 May, less than three months from now. The price of gas will increase by €17 and by €19 for every fill of home heating oil. The cost of the latter has already increased by 53%. Can the Tánaiste state that he will stop that increase taking place at a time when people are seriously struggling?

Rent also has a serious impact in the context of inflation. Rent is increasing by 8%. We need to ban rent increases. We have put those proposals before the Government not weeks or months but years ago. We must put back into people's pockets a refundable tax credit of up to €1,500. Cutting the cost of childcare is another way to reduce the cost of living on these families. It should be reduced by a third and the proper investment should be made.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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I thank the Deputy.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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There are solutions there.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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I thank the Deputy. The time is up.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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We have given the Government the solutions time and time again. When is the Government going to act on them?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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The Government acknowledges that inflation, in particular the type of inflation that we have at the moment, which is very much driven by higher energy prices, is impacting on those with lower incomes more so than those with higher incomes. That is clear. People on lower incomes spend more on energy and fuel, or a higher percentage of their income on energy, fuel and groceries than those on higher incomes. As a consequence of that - the Deputy is right about this - inflation impacts on different households in different ways. At the moment, inflation is impacting more seriously on lower income households than higher income households. In recognition of that, in the budget we did increase core social welfare rates. We also increased the fuel allowance, the living alone allowance and the child dependant allowance. We did those things precisely because it was the lowest incomes that were impacted most. As I said earlier, we acknowledge that more needs to be done. We are working on those proposals now. I hear the Deputy’s proposal for an increase in core social welfare rates. The difficulty with that is that a lot of working people are not on social welfare. Deputy Doherty might not appreciate this, but people who are working hard, who earn middle incomes or who might look like they have good incomes on paper, also have to deal with the high cost of living and his proposal would exclude them.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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What about childcare and rent?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Yes, but what about somebody who has a mortgage or somebody who is not on social welfare? His proposal would not help them.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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What about childcare, rent and fuel allowance eligibility?

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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In 2018 the Tánaiste told the European Parliament that Ireland was a climate laggard and promised to do much more to protect the environment. Four years later, the European Commission is not very impressed with the Government's progress. A director in the European Commission's Directorate-General for Environment, Aurel Ciobanu-Dordea, recently gave a speech in which he did not just give the Government both barrels, he actually rolled up in a tank and launched a volley of heavy fire in its direction. I do not have time to list all the egregious breaches of environmental laws and standards that he cited among his laundry list of complaints, but I will just give a flavour. He noted that 50% of Ireland's urban waste water is still not treated in compliance with the urban waste water treatment directive. In case there is any doubt about how shameful this is, it should be noted that said directive dates from 1991. Leakage rates are one of the highest in Europe, currently at an enormous 40%. The water framework directive has still not been fully implemented. The deadline for that was 2003. Meanwhile, almost half of Ireland's rivers have unsatisfactory water quality due to high nitrate levels, which have increased by 26% since 2014.

On our biodiversity crisis, Mr. Ciobanu-Dordea highlighted that many of our bird species are in serious decline, with 54 now on a red list and facing extinction. Further, just 2.5% of our marine waters are designated marine protected areas. The EU target to which we have agreed in this regard is 30%.

On failures of governance, Mr. Ciobanu-Dordea said he was particularly concerned with the punitive cost to the public of access to justice, with anyone wishing to take an environmental case forced into the most expensive legal arena in Europe, which is the Irish High Court. Also of deep concern to the Commission is the recent trend among developers to issue strategic lawsuit against public participation, SLAPP, suits. These are being launched against environmental campaigners. This manifests as wealthy developers threatening individual members of community groups with financial ruin by suing them in the High Court for defamation if they dare to challenge planning decisions. The Government's answer to that charge, if the Tánaiste's colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, is to be believed, is to make it even harder and more expensive for campaigners to take these cases.

How are we expected to take the Tánaiste's commitments on the environment seriously given this shameful record? Could he confirm his intention to further butcher our planning laws and make it even harder and more expensive to take cases to protect the environment? When will the Government publish the review of our defamation law, which for months has been sitting on the desk of the Minister for Justice?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I saw some media reports on the report in question. I have not had a chance to read it, and it would not be fair to comment on it until I have had a chance to do so. When I said in 2018 that Ireland was a climate laggard and our ambition was to be a climate leader, I meant that. At the time, an NGO that scores countries on where they stand in terms of climate action and environmental commitment placed us in the lowest tier of countries. We have now moved up slightly. We are in the second-lowest tier. We are certainly not a leader, but we are not in the laggard group either any more, and that is because of the work that has been done since 2019, ably led by the Minister, Deputy Ryan, in this coalition. We have a long way to go, whether it is in terms of climate action, water quality or biodiversity. We understand that as a Government and we are working very hard on it.

On planning, what the Government intends to do is what is set out in the programme for Government, which was supported by all three parties in government and signed up to not just by Deputies but also by ordinary members of all three parties. That is to make sure that we have a planning process that makes decisions quickly, appropriately, and fairly. We have a system in Ireland where, generally speaking, the planning application goes through a council, a decision is then made and people have the right of appeal and they can appeal to An Bord Pleanála. That is the process. It is not expensive for people to make an objection to the council or make an observation to An Bord Pleanála. Judicial reviews are only supposed to happen on a point of law. That is the whole point of a judicial review. It is not supposed to assess whether it is right or wrong to grant planning permission. That is for An Bord Pleanála to decide. Its planners are the experts. The point of a judicial review is not to rehash the planning arguments or the rights or wrongs of a particular development, it is to double check that An Bord Pleanála or the council followed the correct procedures. That is what a judicial review is supposed to be about. Some people are trying to turn judicial reviews into something else. That is manifestly wrong in my view.

If we look at the number of planning cases that go to judicial review in Ireland compared with other countries, we can see that there is a higher percentage here. It is easier to get something judicially reviewed in Ireland than in other countries. That is a problem. There may be different reasons for that. It may be due to deficiencies in our planning laws. If that is the case, we need to change them. It may be because of mistakes being made by councils and An Bord Pleanála, in which case we need to make sure they make fewer mistakes. It may be the case that they do not have enough resources or expertise. We may need to help them with that as well, but we also need to bear in mind that under our process, when a judicial review happens, a judge does not necessarily have to hear both sides of the argument before allowing a judicial review to take place. Sometimes a judge can allow a judicial review without actually hearing what the consequences could be, and there can be consequences.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Ceann Comhairle)
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I thank the Tánaiste.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Big investments on which I have worked very hard were nearly lost to Ireland because of the delays caused by judicial reviews. Some were lost. That is a real consequence for real people who lose out on jobs and lose out on investment, and we have to take that into account.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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The increase in the number of judicial reviews in this country coincides completely with the introduction of the strategic housing development, SHD, planning process. That is because SHDs bypass local democracy, so there was not an opportunity for people to put in planning objections to local councils. They only had the opportunity to raise objections with An Bord Pleanála. If that failed, the only course open to them was judicial review. The fact is that more than 90% of the judicial reviews relating to SHDs were successful. This indicates that those people were 100% correct in bringing those reviews and that the fault is not with them for bringing the reviews or for clogging up the judicial system, it is with bad planning and bad planning laws and comes down to an inability on the part of people to engage with democracy and planning decisions at local level.

I note the Government has decided to do away with the strategic housing developments, SHDs, but it gave so much time and opportunity to developers to launch hundreds of in local communities. We are dealing with these. I deal with them in north Wicklow and every few weeks there is another application which people want to object to. Can the Tánaiste respond to those issues please?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy. The thinking behind the SHDs was to speed up planning and to get planning permissions through more quickly for housing and apartments. It did not work which is why we had to change our policy on strategic housing developments by going back to something similar to an older system where the application is made to the council first and then there is a right of appeal to An Bord Pleanála.

From the Deputy’s contribution it sounds to me that she thinks judicial reviews are all about housing. They are not. A major expansion of Intel in north Kildare was threatened by judicial review. It was a hugely important project for this country in terms of our industrial development and the tax revenues we receive to help pay for healthcare, childcare and housing and in providing jobs for people, not just in Kildare but in the Deputy’s constituency, Wicklow, and in my constituency, Dublin West. Really important road projects are threatened by judicial reviews. In time, I am absolutely sure that we will see the same happen with the metro and other important public infrastructure projects.

It is a problem that the building of important public infrastructure, such as roads, railways and windfarms to help deal with climate action, cost more and take longer in Ireland, in part because of judicial reviews. We need to deal with that.

Marian Harkin (Sligo-Leitrim, Independent)
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I want to raise a very difficult issue with the Tánaiste this morning which relates to the overuse of and in some cases addiction to over-the-counter medication, in particular, those medications which contain codeine. The context in which I am raising this is the death of a young 39-year-old woman at Sligo University Hospital just over two weeks ago. That happened because of her addiction to over-the-counter opioid-containing medication. Her name was Laura Newell and her sad and untimely death has been reported in many newspapers. The reason I am raising this with the Tánaiste is that her sister, whom I know, wrote to me and, indeed, to all of the public representatives in the Sligo-Leitrim Constituency, and asked us to raise the issue of dependence on and addiction to over-the-counter painkillers in Ireland. She specifically stated, “I await your response in the hope that my family can rely on you to raise these concerns at the highest level.” She went on to state, “My hope would be that legislation could be put in place that will remove the medicine from behind the counter and be available ... only through consultation with the GP.”

It is a long email and it is heart-breaking because it tells how the 39-year-old woman died painfully from addiction. Her sister names the over-the-counter medication. I will not do so here, but it is a household name. There is nothing extraordinary about Laura Newell’s sad story but her addiction started as a response to the need for pain medication due to undiagnosed endometriosis. In order to try to deal with her pain, she started taking over-the-counter opioid medication. As her sister said, the drugs she was addicted to are legal and easy to obtain. She said that she was buying them from chemists throughout the county and further afield. Recently, she started accessing them online from pharmacies across Ireland. She said that these purchases are unregulated and make it easy for addicts to access opioid medicines. There is much more in it and it is a sad email but the core of this is that her family have decided to be quite candid about her death. As her sister said, if there is to be any sense out of her loss, it would be the prevention of any other family going through this experience.

In that context I am asking the Tánaiste if his Government will consider two things - to review the legislation and regulation around the sale of over-the-counter painkillers containing codeine and to look at the whole issue of pain management. It is not just enough to put regulation in place. We must also help people to deal with the issue of pain and chronic pain, which is a very significant concern for people all over the country. I can guarantee the Tánaiste that there are people sitting here in this Chamber today who know what that is. This is a big issue and I would like to hear a considered response from the Tánaiste.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy. I will discuss this with the Minister of State, Deputy Feighan, and with the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, and will provide the Deputy with a more considered response a little bit later on. I had a chance to read the article about Laura Newell and her family in The Sligo Champion. I express my condolences to the family on Laura’s loss and to her two daughters aged 18 and 15 who have been left behind. I want also to express my thanks to the Newell family for being willing to talk about this issue as we do not talk enough about the issue of prescription drug addiction in Ireland. It is a very real problem. It is very sad to see that she started taking painkillers because her endometriosis had not been diagnosed. Endometriosis is frequently not diagnosed, which is a real shame, because once diagnosed, it can be treated very successfully. Unfortunately, that did not happen in her case.

Her story tells us something that all of us know which is that addiction can happen to anyone from any background or walk of life. It is very important that we recognise that the people who suffer from addiction need help. They should not be stigmatised or criminalised and they also need to be reassured that if they seek help, their medication will not be taken away from them, or that they will at least be given an alternative, which is very important.

Prescription drugs are a hidden addiction much of the time in Ireland. Sometimes it is codeine, other times it is benzos and other drugs. I had an opportunity over the past number of weeks to watch “Dopesick”. I am not sure if Members have seen that programme but it is about the OxyContin prescription drug dose epidemic in America. It is a different jurisdiction, a different drug and a different system but it gives a real insight into the problems that any country can have with prescription drugs where they are not properly regulated and are easily abused. It is based on a book called Empire of Painwhich I have not as yet read but it is on my reading list.

On codeine, specifically, because of its potential for misuse, it is a controlled drug under the Misuse of Drugs Acts 1977 to 1984. Some low-dose preparations are currently available without prescription and are most commonly used in combination with other analgesics like paracetamol or ibuprofen for pain relief. Less frequently, it is used as a single ingredient cough suppressant. Low-dose preparations such as these are regulated as Schedule 5 controlled drugs. At the moment these drugs can all be sold in pharmacies under the personal supervision of a pharmacist and are not available for self-selection. The maximum dose of codeine in a non-prescription product is limited per the medical products regulations with the maximum daily dose authorised duration of no longer than three days. Pack sizes are limited as well. Codeine was a medicine that was very easily available over-the-counter in the past and it is more tightly regulated now. Somebody going into a pharmacy looking for codeine, Solpadeine or Nurofen Plus cannot just buy it and will be asked questions by the pharmacist but, perhaps, that is not enough. It is something that the Health Products Regulatory Authority, HPRA, will want to give further examination to.

Marian Harkin (Sligo-Leitrim, Independent)
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I thank the Tánaiste. We all deeply sympathise with the family of Laura Newell. The purpose of this discussion is to ask what can be done about it and how can we prevent it happening again. Her sister talked to me about what happened in Australia. That country banned over-the-counter painkiller medication in 2018 and it has worked for that country. It has not caused many of the problems that the people there thought it might cause. I would like to hear, if not today but certainly very soon, that this Government will examine this issue and look at the possibility of doing that.

When I was a Member of the European Parliament, I chaired the pain group and we were involved with the WHO in ensuring that for the first time two years ago pain was seen as a disease in its own right as distinct from a symptom of another disease. One of the issues we face is that pain management is woefully under-resourced in this country.

A two-pronged approach is needed. I hope the Tánaiste can give me some positive indication that he will consider that.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I will have to double-check with the Minister for Health and the Minister of State, Deputy Feighan, as to exactly what the legal position is on this matter. There are two regulators in this area, as the Deputy knows. The Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland regulates pharmacists and is responsible for making sure that pharmacists do not hand out these medicines too easily, while the Health Products Regulatory Authority is responsible for the regulation of medicines, including controlled drugs such as these. I am not sure if it is a ministerial or Government decision or a regulatory one but I will look into it and come back to the Deputy in a few weeks with something a bit more solid.

Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent)
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Many farmers in this country are facing a wipeout this year due to the astronomical increases in fertiliser costs. A farmer who paid €300 last year for a tonne, or 20 bags, of the most popular type of fertiliser will pay €900 this year. This is an astonishing increase that will leave many farmers with a nightmare decision as to how they will pay for fertiliser this year. Experts estimate that a farmer with 100 ha will end up paying €40,000 more for fertiliser this year. In fairness, most farmers I know would not own 100 ha but most would own 50 ha so their fertiliser costs will increase by €20,000. A typical mid-sized farmer feeding 120 tonnes of rations and using 30 tonnes of fertiliser per year will see his or her fertiliser bill rising by €23,400 a year. No farmer can take this hit. They will simply go out of business, owing co-ops throughout the country tens of thousands of euro.

The Government is well aware of this crisis. In October, the Taoiseach was told on the floor of the Dáil by the Rural Independent Group that this fertiliser crisis was imminent and that the Government needed to do something about it immediately. In November, another member of our group told the Taoiseach to take action immediately. In the past couple of weeks, we have been pleading with the Government to take action but we have heard nothing to date about what the Government have done. The week before last at a meeting of the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine, I challenged Mr. Fabien Santini of the EU agriculture committee on solutions to this crisis. He said that the rising price of gas was mainly to blame, as well as the fact that import levies are adding to the crisis. However, he also stated that the government of each member state has been given latitude to provide unique farmer support through the relaxation of the state aid framework. He further stated that this will only be available until June 2022 and would allow for financial aid.

Shamefully, at that same meeting, the Green Party member of the committee emphatically expressed that he wanted to broaden the issue to ask why we are so dependent on fertiliser. He said, "The reality is that these artificial fertilisers are having a devastating effect locally". He further stated:

In addition, using these inputs allows us to grow more grass and have higher stocking rates in our farms. That has a knock-on increase on the methane that we produce. All in all, it seems to make sense to drive the organic angle ...

My worry is that such deranged thinking is feeding into the mindset of the Government and is detrimental to the food chain in this country. It is astonishing that our Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael-Green Party Government has so far failed to use the tools referred to by Mr. Santini to assist our crisis-struck farmers. It is shameful that our Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine has completely failed to take action despite the crisis we are in. Irish farming families need a strong Government at this time and a subsidy is immediately needed for farmers who purchase fertilisers, perhaps one similar to the subsidy given to farmers during the fodder crisis some years back. Maybe I am wrong and maybe the Greens are not wagging the tail of this Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Government. If not, what has the Government discussed at Cabinet since the Taoiseach was told of this fertiliser cost crisis, which affects tens of thousands of farmers, in October and November? What solutions has the Government put in place to save many farmers from wipe-out this year?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I am not at liberty to tell the Deputy what was and was not discussed at Cabinet, but I can tell him that the Government is seized of this issue. I had an opportunity to meet with the Irish Farmers Association, IFA yesterday, alongside the Minister of State, Deputy Heydon. It raised a lot of issues, including climate action, the Common Agricultural Policy, its concerns around the dairy forum, which I share, and the problems the pig industry is facing. One of the matters raised was the very high price and cost of fertilisers, which in some cases have even trebled in cost. That is an extraordinary increase for any input and it will, in turn, increase costs for farmers. The latter can then drive up food prices, which impacts negatively on consumers. The levels of dry farming could potentially come down as well, which we do not want to happen.

While there are a number of factors at play in the market, there is unfortunately no sign of fertiliser prices easing in the short to medium term. Energy prices will remain well above January 2021 levels and increased global demand continues, particularly from the big grain-producing countries. Increased transport costs and EU-imposed tariffs on duties on certain third country imports are also adding to prices. The information we have from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine indicates that fertiliser supplies are likely to remain tight but usage is expected to be lower over the next few months in response to higher prices. From 2 February, Russia imposed a ban on ammonium nitrate exports for two months until 2 April. This will place added pressure on the availability of fertiliser, particularly calcium ammonium nitrate. The Department is continuing to monitor the situation very closely.

My colleague, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy McConalogue, launched the 2022 soils, nutrients and fertiliser campaign on 26 January in response to the unprecedented rise in fertiliser prices. As part of this campaign Teagasc has put together a comprehensive information pack for farmers and their advisers with a compendium of 20 fact sheets designed to optimise the use of plant nutrients to help farmers address the challenge of maintaining their farm outputs in the face of rising fertiliser costs and reduced availability. These fact sheets cover soil testing, lime application, nitrogen use, organic manures, fertiliser spreading and many other topics that will be incredibly useful for farmers.

The European Commission is currently examining the effect on the European market of removing anti-dumping measures. A decision on this is expected shortly. If that decision is favourable, it may allow us to do something more to help.

Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent)
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I thank the Tánaiste for his reply, but it was muddled to say the least. The most he said is that farmers will get an information pack. Farmers do not want an information pack; they want some of the kind of relief of the sort that Mr. Santini of the EU agricultural committee told us two weeks ago can be given by the Government. We know of farmers who could not get credit and who had to pay upfront for fertiliser in November and December. They are not able to sustain this astronomical increase in the cost of fertiliser. The Tánaiste says the Russians are the problem. We saw what happened last week with the Russians and the fishermen. We will have to send out a couple of farmers to resolve this issue, seeing as the fishermen were the only ones who could resolve the issue last week. The resolution to this problem lies with the Government. It can intervene and is failing to do so. Please tell me the Government is going to intervene. What interventions is it going to make in order to assist farmers? They do not need an information package. They are not stupid. They are well aware of what is going on. Their pockets are being dented hot and heavy and the Government is not doing anything about it even though it can. I am pleading with the Tánaiste to stand by the farmers of this country immediately.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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We would all agree that reduced use of fertiliser would be beneficial. It would be beneficial environmentally and would also help reduce costs for farmers. I do not think we should dismiss Teagasc in trying to give advice to farmers on how they can do that. I am sure the vast majority know all of this already but there may be people who benefit from that additional advice and I do not think it should be dismissed in that way. I acknowledge that reducing fertiliser use is not going to solve this problem. We need to reduce the price as well. We are, in comparison with other EU countries, a very small market when it comes to fertiliser sales. No fertilisers are manufactured in Ireland and this results in indigenous fertiliser companies being price-takers, dependent on global supply and demand and subject to exchange rates. The Minister is working with the European Commission on this, particularly in relation to trade defence instruments such as the imposition of duties and tariffs, which are done on a European level. If we could get some change on that it would help bring down prices. We are working on that at the moment.