Results 361-380 of 7,129 for speaker:Michael Fitzmaurice
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: A few weeks ago the Tánaiste was taking Leaders' Questions and I brought up a difficult case in County Roscommon of a youngster who has autism. He basically rips 20 T-shirts a week, takes out everything from the fridge at night, and can go out and damage the car. His father was at his wit's end and actually lost his job over it. His father was looking for residential care for his...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: What the Taoiseach has said does not give great hope for those parents who are waiting at the moment. In fact, I know of a parent today who had to go to the other end of the country to pay for a consultation and a diagnosis. It is not acceptable to have to travel 120 or 130 miles to try to get a diagnosis and to pay for it themselves rather than the State helping them out. While it...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: First, I thank the witnesses for coming in. I will be quick and I ask for short, quick answers. There is a lot of confusion about the SCEP. If I have an enclosed herd and my cows were four or five star and they came down to three stars, am I correct that nothing changes while I am in SCEP? Is that right or wrong?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: Right. That is for the cow. If I have an enclosed herd and I bought a four or five star bull, which bulled the cows last summer, and I have calves coming forward, even if my cows have been reduced to two stars, and my bull has been reduced to two stars, are the heifer calves coming forward that I hold on my farm eligible under SCEP at this time?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: They are not eligible for the person going forward in the SCEP.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: Is it correct that if I am selling them they are not eligible either?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: That is going to have dire consequences for the people who have signed up to SCEP if the figures have gone wrong on their farm.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: There will be dire consequences.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: That is the first point. I want to get my head around this. I follow the kills in factories and over the last four or five years, even with all our genomics in dairy and beef, overall, we have lighter carcasses. Mr. Coughlan will probably be able to give me a breakdown between beef and dairy. If we want to talk about carbon, we are now killing four cattle to probably three going back...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: Mr. Coughlan said they have gained weight. Why do 24 of the top 50 on the new proposal have one star for carcass weight?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: It is pretty important when you are killing them, on the bullock side.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: What is meant by resistance to TB, if ICBF only uses TB test responses in TB breakdown animal cohorts as the measurement of resistance?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: There is not one scientific test to say it is right.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: I will put this on the record. I spoke to someone in England who has researched TB. Am I correct that the ICBF looked at the guts of 4 million cattle, dropped it down to 780,000 for the pedigree, then selected 144,000, of which 14,000 were bulls? Will ICBF tell me that under the new TB approach, I will not get TB?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: Okay. Am I correct that with 300 herds at 50 a piece, we are almost free from TB? That is the Department's guide. Is that right or wrong?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: That is the figure that is used.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: There is no such thing as resistance, according to the people who have researched it, because stress causes TB, they can have a gene-----
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: The bottom line is that different cattle react in different ways. If you put stress onto cattle, some of them will show up with TB. Some of them might never show up with TB.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: Going by when I looked at it-----
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Recent Reclassification of Beef Indexes: Discussion (13 Dec 2023)
Michael Fitzmaurice: I will tell you one thing. The people who have researched TB all their lives in England and Ireland have given me documents which strongly disagree with the system the ICBF is using.