asked the Minister for Agriculture if he will state (i) the total quantity of farmers' butter purchased under the subsidy scheme of 1947; (ii) the total cost to the State of the scheme; (iii) the quantity of this butter sold for human consumption and the price received; (iv) the quantity disposed of as unfit for human consumption and the price received; and (v) the nature of the guarantee given to the firms that purchased and stored butter under the scheme.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Farmers' Butter Purchase.
The information required by the Deputy is as follows:—
(i) The farmers' butter acquired under the scheme was sold both for household use and for manufacturing purposes. The quantity purchased by the Butter Marketing Committee—the body authorised by the Minister for Agriculture to distribute the butter for household use — was 16,427 cwt. I have no information as to the quantity sold by butter factories for manufacturing purposes on the home market.
(ii) The total cost of the scheme — exclusive of administrative expenses, which would be difficult to estimate— was approximately £93,000.
(iii) and (iv) Of the total quantity of 16,427 cwt. of butter acquired by the Butter Marketing Committee, 13,594 cwt. were sold to the public at a price of 2s. 8d. per lb., and 695 cwt. were sold to confectioners at 3s. 4d. per lb. The balance of 2,138 cwt., which was unfit for human consumption, was exported for industrial purposes. The price obtained was 210/- per cwt., or 1s. 10½d. per lb.
(v) Registered butter factories who purchased farmers' butter from producers at a price of not less than 2/11 per lb. and resold it to the Butter Marketing Committee at a price of 268/10 per cwt., that is 2/4¾d. per lb., were paid an allowance of 104/6 per cwt., that is 11¼d. per lb. The margin of 5d. per lb. between the price paid and amount received by the factories was intended to cover their collection and processing costs. The allowance was not payable if less than 2/11 per lb. were paid to the producer or if the butter were resold for manufacturing purposes. For sales to manufacturers the butter factories were permitted to charge 3/4 per lb.
May I ask if this guarantee to the wholesalers was given irrespective of the quality of the butter?
I understand that there was a proviso that the butter was to be of satisfactory quality but, if you are holding butter, after a lifetime's experience of the commodity, you can discern with reasonable certainty that butter comes within that general description at a quarter past four on Monday afternoon but that at 9 o'clock on Tuesday morning it is going to have a very hard struggle to get through. You, accordingly, sell it to the Government on Monday afternoon.
Will the Minister agree that if there had been some tightening up of the scheme it could have been made to work?
Would the Deputy suggest to me, if there is a statutory obligation on the Government to purchase farmers' butter of satisfactory quality, if a butter merchant claims his statutory right on Monday afternoon that the butter is of satisfactory quality and it is of satisfactory quality, but has reached an age venerable enough to make it highly likely that 24 or 48 hours later its quality may be very defective, what can the Government do but comply with its statutory requirement to buy the butter, although it knows full well that after 24 or 48 hours' residence in its new abode it will be in a position far from satisfactory and that its condition will continue to deteriorate?
Would the Minister not agree that no precautions whatever were taken in the selection of the butter from the producer?
Certainly not. The officers of my Department were most conscientious and scrupulous in the discharge of the duty placed upon them by the regulations made. From the dilemma which I have described for the Deputy I cannot see that the most conscientious public servant had any escape.
There was no precaution taken. That is the point.