Feargal Quinn (Independent)

We had an interesting debate on dairy farming last night. The Minister with responsibility for food and agriculture - I always place food before agriculture - made an interesting contribution to the debate. What concerned me was the belief that these problems can be solved by the Government. What also concerned me was the interesting view on the Common Agricultural Policy in the book issued by the Irish Farmers Association and the idea that production of food will be maintained irrespective of whether customers want it. The economist, Mr. Jim Power, attended a meeting of the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and referred to 100,000 jobs in food production being lost in the next two years.

There seems to be some belief among farmers and in the Government that these problems can be solved by Government. They can be solved only by customers and by people deciding what products they want and will buy. If we decide to buy imported products, jobs will be lost. If we decide to buy products that we want to keep on the shelves, they will remain on the shelves as long as we buy them. The answer is not in the Government's hands, it is in the hands of those who live in Ireland - the citizens. If we want to keep those goods on the shelves, we must buy them. We must refuse to buy substitute products from elsewhere. Customers have a choice of what supermarket to go to. If a supermarket has decided to remove Irish products from the shelves, customers should decide to shop elsewhere where these products can be found. The threat to which Mr. Power refers is if all supermarkets follow what one supermarket chain has done, we will lose 100,000 jobs in the next few years. The answer is in the hands of consumers and customers. We can solve this problem, not politicians.