Ulick Burke (Fine Gael)

I support Senator Bradford's call for an amendment to the Order of Business. It is important to have the Minister for Agriculture and Food here because, since we joined the EU, no agriculture Minister representing Ireland has presided over the demise of an Irish agricultural industry. This is the oldest Irish industrial process relating to agriculture. As Senator Kitt said, we know what happened in Tuam. We are also aware of what happened in Thurles, Carlow and now Mallow. Not only will this closure affect the sugar beet industry, it will have far wider repercussions on every strand of the Irish agricultural industry, including crop rotation and so on. It will change completely agriculture in this country.