Kevin Humphreys (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I hope the Minister will take it into consideration that I am probably the most disconnected person from rural Ireland. When I went back through my family tree recently, I discovered that on the Humphreys side we have to go back to the 17th century to find somebody involved in agriculture. It is a little more recent on my mother's side - I think we had someone involved in agriculture in 1820. That does not mean that I do not understand, or try to understand, the pressures that small farmers find themselves under. I think those who are running small family farms and those who are working for the minimum wage have a lot in common. Both of them are struggling in the current economic crisis.

I listened closely to Senator Paul Daly, who understands this sector and has educated me in many ways through many of his speeches. I think he spoke quite positively today about looking at other streams of income and about the impact that climate change will have on small family farms in rural Ireland. If we are really talking about a just transition, that is where we have to look and provide assistance. Family farms are a central part of the tapestry that is Ireland. It will not exist unless there is a healthy and thriving rural economy. People must be able to live in the countryside with a good quality and standard of living. Senator Marshall has often made those points.

In my home area where I grew up and where I still live, I used to have two flour mills on my doorstep. The Mini was assembled at a British Leyland plant in the neighbourhood. There were coalyards in the area as well. We have no car assembly plant now. The coalyards are gone. All the flour mills are gone out of Ireland, with the exception of boutique-type flour mills. The Odlums mill was the last one to go. At a time when we are talking about food security, I think questions need to be asked about the fact that we cannot mill our own wheat for white bread. I know there always had to be a mix in that regard.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak about the beef sector. When I looked at the hard figures that are available, I was reminded that agriculture is this country's most important native industry. It is the most important industry in rural Ireland, where it accounts for 170,000 jobs. As I got involved in politics, I went back to look at these hard facts. It has been mentioned that agriculture accounts for 8% of employment, but that increases to 60% outside urban areas. That is how important agriculture is. It accounts for €26 billion in economic activity each year and for 138,000 jobs.

When we think about who will be hardest hit in the event of a no-deal Brexit, we must bear in mind that many of the 80,000 jobs that will be at risk are in the Border counties. Although there will be some counterbalancing of the job losses, that will happen in my home patch of Dublin and in Cork. There will not be a plus sign in the ledger for rural Ireland. It will be bad news after bad news. It is projected that €800 million will be torn out of pockets as a result of Brexit. There is ongoing uncertainty regarding the price of cattle. It is expected that there will be a further €100 decrease in the per-head price of cattle. People in urban Ireland do not understand that this can be the difference between surviving and not surviving. I did not understand it until quite recently. I supported the protests at the factory gates because I knew it was a last shout for the survival of rural Ireland. I am proud to be a member of a party of social solidarity. Like my colleague, Deputy Penrose, I offered the hand of solidarity to those protests.

I read a speech made by the Taoiseach recently in which he remarked said that some jobs and companies in rural Ireland will not be saved. I would like to ask him what those companies are and where those jobs are. We need to know now. We need to start planning. Even now, it is too late to start planning because families in rural Ireland depend so much on jobs.If we have already written off those companies and jobs in the accounts books, can we at least now say where they are? Let us try to right the unfairness that will befall rural Ireland with regard to Brexit.

I have visited the National Ploughing Championships previously to talk to farmers, as I have been genuinely interested in understanding what is happening. The CAP has been reformed. The European Court of Auditors has put a question mark over CAP reforms and whether the CAP still benefits larger farmers. I find a level of frustration among family farmers. In 2017, the average family farm made €31,000 and received €18,000 in CAP payments. Well over 50% of these farmers' income came from CAP payments. That sounds reasonably good but when one pulls back the cover, one can see that 40% of CAP payments go to 10% of farmers. We must get underneath that and understand it. Two thirds of farmers get a quarter of CAP payments. Farmers in County Cork received €170 million in payments while farmers in Leitrim received €18 million. A place with four times the number of farmers gets ten times the subsidy. I am not talking about acreage. I am talking about people and families involved in farming. When those figures were presented to me, I had spoken to people from Leitrim about matters like tree planting and their fears of being hemmed in by the new forestry actions. They have real fears. We have an afforestation programme, which I support, that aims to get forestry up to the European average but we must listen to concerns.

Only today, it was pointed out that the highest CAP payments go to the largest farmers. One sees the farmers at the gates protesting and then one discovers that Larry Goodman and his family received €240,000 in farm payments. He has 8,000 head of cattle and an estimated fortune somewhere north of €700 million. One third of Irish farmers make less than €10,000 per year. That is tough going. A farmer in Wexford received €390,000 under the old process in respect of 3,500 acres of tillage for barley. One talks to farmers who are struggling and they tell me about figures like that. Perhaps the Minister will correct those figures but this is what farmers are telling me. They pointed out that the average farm in Ireland is just 30 ha. O'Shea Farms has some €10 million in total assets yet was given €330,000 in CAP payments. I can share farmers' frustration when they are trying to carve out a living and those figures are in the newspapers, while they get less than €10,000 per year on which to live. For every one of these names, there are hundreds more. I could go through them as I have lists detailing very large payments to very large farmers. Unfortunately, one cannot get lists of the smaller farmers and the payments they receive because no names are published when the payment is less than €1,250. A farmer in Manorhamilton was paid 3 cent in CAP payments. These are figures published on various websites and in research. I can understand why farmers were at the gates. It was because they could see their livelihoods disappearing in front of them. I found it hard that they were being told that the future of the sector was in balance. They were called upon to act responsibly and to save the farming community.

A just transition means that we must give real and positive assistance to rural Ireland. I will stand shoulder to shoulder with rural representatives to argue for the small farmer - the farmer struggling on a low income or struggling to put his children through education. I will stand up in this House on a regular basis and criticise political parties that stand up for the ranchers and for big subsidies to go to big farmers who are well able to stand on their own two feet. Unfortunately, this has been the record in Ireland for far too long. We must protect our rural communities in a very practical and substantial way. They have been under pressure for far too long.