Michael McCarthy (Labour)

A number of advertisements are being run in this morning's newspapers by the Department of Agriculture and Food. They call on those who are involved in any way with the poultry trade to register and advise them of their obligations under the Diseases of Animals Act 1966 and registration of poultry flocks audit 2005. They also advise those who are involved in rearing turkeys for local consumption, especially coming up to the Christmas season. I accept fully the need to have a register of these people in the face of the serious threat of avian influenza but I am concerned about two issues. The first is that we may have over-regulation when this issue passes. Second, I do not want a repeat of what we saw recently where the Revenue Commissioners examined cases involving people who had invested in insurance policies. In many cases the maturity of the policies did not match the penalties they received because some of the money invested in those policies was found not to be subject to the routine tax regulations. The Revenue Commissioners looked into those insurance policies and then penalised people. I would be very concerned that the Revenue Commissioners would use this register to delve into cases where people have small land holdings and very small poultry enterprises for local consumption and go after them, so to speak, in the same manner in which they went after people with insurance policies.

Another aspect of the advertisements that surprises me is that people are advised to get the application form for registration either from the Department website or the local agricultural office. Not everybody is competent in terms of e-mail and using the Internet and not everybody has access to it. I repeat the point I made in the House recently on publicjobs.ie. The most recent Garda recruitment campaign was only accessible to potential applicants through publicjobs.ie. That was a significant recruitment drive in that for the first time it included non-nationals but I thought it was a little restrictive. The least that should have been done was to allow the dual method of hard copy and on-line application. The availability of on-line application is to be welcomed but we must be cognisant of the fact that not everybody has access to it.

Is the statement made yesterday by Deputy Liz O'Donnell in the Lower House official Government policy? I am a little fed up with dual Government and Opposition roles from some members of the Government in the Lower House in particular.