Paddy Burke (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Trevor Sargent, and wish him well. He is doing an excellent job with his portfolio. I am from the era when, if we worked in the sugar fields and got hungry, we lit a fire and cooked the rashers and sausages on the spade or the fork. When we went to the bog to cut turf, we also lit a fire to boil water for tea. When we went to football or hurling matches, we brought bottles of tea with us. In some cases people put the bottles in socks to bring them to the match. If a biscuit or a sweet fell on the floor, one picked it up and ate it. If one did not, somebody else would.

Now, we are in the era of boil-in-the-bag and the microwave. Sadly, due to the stringent controls imposed on restaurants, in many cases those establishments have also reverted to boil-in-the-bag and the microwave. As I said in the debate on this matter in the scrutiny committee, I support food labelling. I believe we should consider introducing labelling which states when a product is non-European. When people travel to other countries and look at the labels on food, the country of origin will be stated on the label. I agree with country-of-origin labelling. However, some European countries are outside the EU but the consumer might not realise it. If, throughout the EU, there was labelling for products from outside the EU, people would be more conscious of the EU product label. It would be more obvious that it was an EU product than if a product was labelled as being from, for example, Poland, Lithuania or Greece. This is an important issue.

The stringent controls on some labelling are daft. The Minister mentioned measurements in his speech. The measurement terms with which I grew up were a cup, a spoon or a teaspoon. Now, measurements are given in kilograms, calories and so forth. It is a matter of educating the public on the type of measurement used. If one can make the portion size uniform throughout Europe, rather than having different portion sizes for countries such as Ireland or Spain, it would be a welcome development.

Senator O'Toole mentioned some interesting aspects of food labelling with regard to local issues. There is a disadvantage for small producers. I am in the restaurant business and it is difficult to use produce from local producers. If, for example, the kitchen is not an adequate size, in many cases one cannot use fresh potatoes because of soil cross contamination. One cannot use potatoes produced a mile up the road which are brought into the restaurant with the clay still on them and washed due to cross contamination but one can use potatoes that contain preservatives and additives but which only last two or three days after one opens the bag. That is a disadvantage for local producers. The same is true for producers of cabbage, carrots and so forth.

This is an obstacle for some restaurants who wish to use local produce. For some reason, the health board insists that the premises is not adequate because due to insufficient space, not enough sinks or some other reason there could be a problem with cross contamination. I always thought soil would not damage anybody but it appears there are problems of cross contamination due to whatever micro-organisms are in the soil. This issue should be examined. Every help should be given to small producers. Their produce should be used, whether that is in local markets in the town or in the local restaurants and bars. It should be available to the local shopkeeper who wishes to sell those products. How one goes about labelling the produce is another issue.

The Minister outlined his position on food labelling. It is a complicated issue, when one considers the nutritional values and so forth. It is particularly complicated for a local, small producer if he must comply with the nutrient value requirements for the produce. I wish the Minister well with this. He means well and undoubtedly there is significant support for labelling. However, as Senator Bradford said, we recently had a problem in the pork and bacon industry, despite the controls in place, including the stringent controls on restaurants, supermarkets and other outlets. Logs had to be kept by restaurants, lorry drivers and wholesalers. The whole thing fell apart at the finish. Nobody knew where the controls were, and it all fell down.

I wish the Minister of State well with regard to the Bill. I agree with labelling. The more information available to the public, the better informed they will be.