Committee on Finance. - Vote 40—Agriculture (Resumed). – Dáil Éireann (17th Dáil) – Tuesday, 24 Nov 1964

Committee on Finance. - Vote 40—Agriculture (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That a supplementary sum not exceeding £6,666,000 be granted to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1965, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Agriculture, including certain Services administered by that Office, and for payment of certain Subsidies and sundry Grants-in-Aid.

Mr. Rooney

I notice in the Supplementary Estimate that there is a very substantial amount required for the calf heifer scheme—£2 million more than the original estimate. It was only £405,000, estimated to be spent in the financial year when this Estimate came before us, and now the Minister requires, in addition to the £405,000, a further £2,550,000. I think the explanation should be available. When the Estimate was before the House some time ago, it should have been possible to indicate more precisely the amount that would be required during the current year for this scheme. Possibly, it will be explained that when this Estimate was being prepared, it was expected that only people engaged in agriculture and farming would be applying, and qualifying, for these grants. Instead of that, we have a situation where a number of financiers with money stacked away have decided that it is good business to cash in on this scheme. The result is they are able to get the full benefit of this scheme, whereas the ordinary farmers cannot.

Let us take the example of an ordinary farmer who already has ten cows. If he increases his stock to 11, and then has 11 calves, he still gets only one grant. If these financiers, who never had cattle and know nothing about cattle, get 11 heifers, they will get 11 grants. That is one explanation for the very large amount now required, that is, it is required for people who have devised ways and means of qualifying for payments of these grants. It was stated earlier in the House that the average payment here is only two heifers per claimant. It is difficult to understand that. I know of some moneyed people who have bought large stocks of heifers in order to get £15 apiece and qualify for this payment.

I would be interested to learn from the Minister at this stage if he would give us a clearer picture regarding the amount of money now required. It is such a colossal increase on the original Estimate that there must be some concrete explanation for it. The experts, in making out the Estimate, should not have been so much astray in forecasting what the demand by the Department was likely to be during the current year. I feel a claim has come in here from sources which were not anticipated by our experts in the Department when this Estimate was originally being prepared.

I still feel it is not the right type of scheme to increase our livestock population here. I believe this £2,550,000 should be available instead to the smaller farmer who is the backbone of livestock production, who is engaged full-time in the business of livestock rearing, and who, consequently, should have the benefit of this. It is well known, and I think the Minister will not contradict me, that quite a number of people who will qualify once for payment of these subsidies will not seek to qualify again, because, having harvested this windfall in the form of this subsidy, they will not be able to qualify again. Take one of these financiers who buys 100 heifers and qualifies then for the payment of 100 subsidies of £15 each. That man will probably finish with that business as soon as the calves are reared and those cattle disposed of, unless he decides to go into business under another name and qualifies again for payment of subsidies on another 100 heifers.

The ordinary small farmer is not able to adopt these devices and his chances of qualifying even for one grant of £15 are very remote, if he is fully stocked already. He has not the accommodation and the means to enable him to increase his stock even by one heifer per annum in order to get the extra £15. There is a limit to the expansion he is capable of. On the other hand, the man who is engaged full-time and is producing ten or 20 calves per annum would benefit better from a scheme which would make the subsidy payable in respect of each calf instead of in respect of each extra heifer brought into calf production.

I should like to hear from the Minister specifically why there is such a big difference between the additional sum required in the current year and the original Estimate of only £405,000. I think it demands a lot of explanation. It reminds me of the time the financiers were going into wheat production and availing of the subsidies. There was one company called the Pure Ice and Cold Storage Company who had something like 1,000 acres of land under wheat. There was a period of very bad weather during that time and they lost a lot, but they were prepared to speculate and put their money into this business of wheat production about which they knew nothing. This heifer scheme seems an easier way of getting money handy, that is, to buy 100 heifers and qualify for 100 calves after keeping them the requisite period and then disposing of them as beef. I think that is the result that is envisaged, but in the long run I do not think it will be of a great advantage to our livestock population or to the people who are the backbone of that industry. They are the people who should have this money within their reach and they should be able to qualify by having the money payable on calves instead of this calved heifer scheme.

I am glad to see that additional moneys are required for different sections of the Department but we must face up to the fact that a substantial part of the Estimate is for increased salaries and allowances owing to the manner in which the Government are running the country in relation to the cost of living and to the reduction in the value of earnings and salaries. The farm building scheme is one that deserves to be encouraged because in this modern age, housing accommodation in every farm, particularly in the small farms, is very important. There is a great lack of housing accommodation amongst our smaller farmers, a lack of accommodation suitable for providing a shelter for livestock and the produce of the farm.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

This is a Supplementary Estimate on which the various subheads may be discussed but housing is outside the scope of the discussion.

Mr. Donegan

It comes in under the heading of "farm buildings".

Mr. Rooney

My remarks were directed only to the part of the Estimate providing an extra £1 million for the Farm Building Scheme. I welcome that. I feel that many farms need extra accommodation. In many instances you see nothing but a farm dwellinghouse with a tiny shed attached, instead of a good farmyard shed in which a good deal of work could be done in times of inclement weather, and which could be used for the storage of crops. An extension of that scheme will show advantages when it comes to putting the surplus on the market or making feeding available for our livestock.

Considering that the British Government have not put a tax on our livestock, every effort should be made to increase our cattle population as rapidly as possible. The heifer subsidy scheme is not the best way to do that and I believe the calf subsidy scheme would enable our livestock population to be increased more rapidly. A greater number of farmers would then be in on the effort to increase their livestock. This is a very important matter for the economy at a time when our industrial exports must shoulder such a heavy burden. Britain is our principal customer for our industrial and livestock exports and an increase in our livestock exports should enable us to offset the heavy burden imposed on our industries.

Mr. Fanning

I intervene in this debate for a few moments to welcome the subsidies. Some of the previous speakers from the opposite benches have painted a false picture of the situation. The last speaker mentioned the case of a farmer with 100 heifers who reared them until he got the subsidy and then sold them. If such a man has 100 heifers and gets £15 each for them this year, he must have their progeny next year. Deputy O'Donnell from Limerick mentioned that if you keep a calf for six or seven months, you should be paid a subsidy. His experience should be the same as mine, that they sell all the calves in County Limerick.

Sir Anthony Esmonde

They should hold them.

Mr. Fanning

I know they should but they sell them. I think the heifer scheme is a good scheme and has helped to increase cattle numbers very considerably. That is what we wanted to do and that is the idea behind the subsidy. The farmers down the country are asking where all the cattle are coming from.

Deputy O'Donnell said that we should be paid on the quality of our milk. I am a member of a creamery committee and I know that you must have good quality milk, as you are paid on the butter fat content. If you have poor quality milk, you will be found out. You cannot supply any kind of milk you like. He also said that those who employ modern methods of milking should get more for their milk but I think the people who go out and milk their cows by hand should be entitled to the same price as those who do it by machinery. Every cow byre in the country is up to date now and it would be unfair to give an extra 2d. per gallon to those who have up-to-date machinery on their farms.

The heifer scheme is a good scheme. It has been said that the small farmer cannot profit by it and, perhaps, the small farmer with four or five cows has not room for any more, but if he wants to hold his heifers, he will find that the price has gone up by £20 or £30 each. Not so long ago the price for a heifer was £25; now it is £50.

On the question of pig fattening stations, I think they are a very good proposition. We have one in Thurles which is run in co-operation with the Irish Sugar Company and which lets out sows for our pig producers. I have done the job myself. They buy back the progeny. You take in the animals, which are weighed, and you are paid the following day, and that is all is about it. It is a great boon to the small farmers. It makes it possible for every small farmer to have a sow, because the production of bonhams has become a good job now. The days of feeding two pigs have gone. Of course there is some difficulty about finding the space, but so have the days of keeping two or three cows. One must work on a big scale nowadays. That is why the pig fattening stations are such good husbandry. We have been well pleased with the price they pay for bonhams and with the elimination of difficulties for the producer.

We had the speech of Deputy M.P. Murphy from West Cork. He suggested that a man producing an amount of milk should get top price for so many gallons and a lesser price for the balance. How could one operate such a scheme? I would never support it. It would not help to increase milk production. Even if one were to put a quota on, one would find it very difficult to work it. The Minister certainly would. You could have three or four farmers getting together to pool for a lorry to transport the milk and what is there to prevent a man who is overproducing putting some of his milk in with that of another farmer?

Mr. Haughey

It would not happen in Tipperary.

Mr. Fanning

It could happen. They count the pounds, shillings and pence there, too. It is funny to hear Deputies suggesting that not a penny from the heifer grant scheme goes into the farmers' pockets. Such suggestions are far from realistic.

I am glad to see that the Supplementary Estimate provides for additional grants to university colleges. That is badly needed. Down the country, long ago, it used to be said that all the bright fellows went away and the duds stayed on the land. It is heartening to note, therefore, that more money is being invested in improved advisory services, in the provision of better buildings.

The county committee of agriculture in North Tipperary, of which I am a member, have appointed extra instructors because there is now a waiting list of farmers seeking advisory services. Farmers are now more than ever before availing of instructors to get planning advice and to get specialist knowledge in the matter of fertilisers. They are getting more up to date, as Deputy J. Brennan said earlier. He was perfectly right.

As I have said, it is foolish to criticise the heifer grant scheme. I do not represent the big ranchers, of whom there are few in North Tipperary. We go in for tillage and milk production in a big way. I intervened only to make the few points I have made. It cannot happen, as has been suggested, that the man who has 100 heifers can get rid of them the following year as beef. He cannot have it both ways. He must have the hundred heifers in respect of which he was paid.

I shall not delay the House any longer but should like to congratulate the Minister. I have not done so already in public. He is a good young man who did a good job in the Department of Justice and who will, I feel confident, do the same in the Department of Agriculture. Most of the people making attacks on him are, I note, city people. I do not care where a man comes from. If he has ability to carry out his duties, he will do so.

Sir Anthony Esmonde

We all, of course, welcome expenditure on agriculture in that we hope it will help to attain greater production. I notice that the Minister, in his speech—I read it because I was not here—concentrated very largely on milk production and related that to beef. I am with him there. However, there is one problem we must face in this country and, in fact, in many other countries in the western hemisphere. It is that costs of production are going up so steeply that milk production in itself is not as lucrative as it was and it is conceivable that we shall find ourselves in the not too distant future short of milk production and, consequently, of the by-products of milk. In other words, we may find ourselves in the position where the creameries will be crying out for milk.

The reason for that happening is the increasing difficulty of procuring labour because the standards of living in the dairy produce sphere are not as good as in the industrial arena. The mainstay and the prop of our creameries have been the big farms. I have noticed in my county recently that a few big farmers have gone out of milk production, due to a shortage of labour. Those people do not want to continue to be slaves all the time and therefore are entering into other types of production, many of them going into beef production.

That is why I noted at the beginning that the Minister related his remarks on milk production to the production of beef. If he reads the papers assiduously, as I believe he does, he will have noticed that another market has appeared in Europe for beef—Spain. With its heavy tourist influx and its inability to produce the requisite amount of food for its own people and the tourists, Spain, which hitherto bought beef from South American sources, has been coming into the market increasingly because the South American sources have dried up.

Perhaps the Minister, new to the job, has no immediate answer. Is he satisfied that the heifer scheme, initiated to increase the production of milk, will help to produce the required amount of beef for an expanding market? Before leaving this subject, I should like to draw his attention to the statement of Mr. A.J. O'Reilly the other day in regard to milk markets and the increasing potentials for the sale of milk and milk products in developing countries, not necessarily the new African States but the Arab States, where he, very wisely, has gone to look for markets.

On the subject of milk, I should like to ask the Minister if he would consider reversing a decision of his predecessor which was responsible for a great deal of chaos among milk producers in my county. For some reason, the Department of Agriculture, acting through the executive authority —the Minister—decided to do away with the creamery we had in Wexford. We had a very strong area in the south —where, I hasten to reassure the Minister, Fianna Fáil have a strong-hold—from which they sent cream to the creameries partially separated and were able to take the milk themselves for feeding purposes. There was a very strong build-up of agricultural husbandry in that area. It was organised and had been going on for a good many years. I believe the origin of the thing was a letter written from New Zealand which put the fear of God into those who conduct our agricultural policy, with the result that the cream husbandry was washed out. This has meant that a lot of people have got out of milk. It has meant that in the creamery they were supplying, which is close to where I live, milk has been in short supply for a time. The farmers were reluctant and were hanging back for a long time, waiting for the Minister to retaliate by withholding the grant from the creamery concerned. There has been a good deal of confusion in the area and I do not know whether it has rectified itself yet or not.

I suggest to the Minister to look at the whole thing and see if he thinks it feasible, right and good for production to return to the original scheme. I know he will encounter a certain amount of opposition from his own devoted officials in this matter who conceived it was out of touch and was not the right thing to do. However, I courteously point out it is the procedure adopted in France, where the dairying industry and the co-operative system are good, where milk production is strong, particularly in the south, and where the by-products are good as well.

I now pass on to beef. I have the feeling that the heifer scheme was intended to increase production. I believe it did increase production, but I also believe it did not increase beef production at the rate necessary. I can confidently assert that anybody who produces beef of good quality in this country is assured of a good and stable market, provided always that our officials and those who represent us in our embassies abroad look for such markets. I base my statement on the facts that emerged from the discussions that took place recently at the European Regional Conference of the FAO and statements made at the World Conference by leading Ministers from the best agricultural producing countries, such as M. Pisani of France, Mr. Freeman of America and so on, that this market is there for the asking providing we produce the beef. It is also the most reliable market, due to the fact that the population is growing at a phenomenal rate in South America and that export from this, one of the great beef producing areas, has now practically ceased.

Some of my colleagues maintain we should have a calf subsidy, while others of them maintain we should continue the heifer subsidy. Listening to Deputy Fanning, I thought he got a bit mixed up in his argument with regard to the question of the success or otherwise of the heifer subsidy in relation to the small farmer. I suggest to the Minister: why could we not have both? The Minister will appreciate, when he is long enough in the Department, it is obvious that the aim and object in this country should be to get the most rapid beef production we can. It is a sure seller. It will offset the great economic difficulties we face at the moment. Many other countries face the same situation. The only way you can get that production is by a calf subsidy.

The Deputy across the way mentioned farmers selling their calves on the dairy farms in Limerick. It is a well-known fact that the dairy farmers in Limerick and South Tipperary breed calves, never give them a pint of milk but get rid of them as soon as they can. They are purely and simply milk producers. There is absolutely no reason why they should not be both, if you give a calf subsidy and encourage them to keep the calves for a certain period, that subsidy not to be paid until the calf has matured. If a reasonable subsidy is given, I guarantee the Minister he will get the production he wants. That is what is essential for agricultural production to meet world conditions today.

There is no use talking about agriculture and imagining Britain is the only agricultural market in the world. As long as the British continue their present efficiency payment system and the Germans, the other great buyers, continue their high rate of subsidy, those are not the only markets. The markets are elsewhere, and it is necessary to look for them.

Finally, I want to say a word on wheat. I hope the Minister, who is new in the Department, is going to protect the farmers against the millers. In the county I come from, which is the premier wheat-growing county in Ireland, we have suffered from the millers and the system which they have operated over the past five or six years. In the year in respect of which the Minister is asking for the subsidy it would have been far bigger but for what happened. The system of the millers was simply this: to turn down ad lib everything they possibly could without the risk of a complete conflagration of the farmers and to buy wheat outside at a cheaper rate. The world price of wheat was below our price. It was depressed. The Canadians and the Americans had enormous surpluses of wheat. It was thrown on the market and could be bought for next to nothing. That is what the millers were doing at the expense of the Irish farmers, unprotected by the Minister for Agriculture. The Minister is now asking for a subsidy to clear them. Suddenly the situation changed. The Chinese, the Russians and other countries behind the Iron Curtain were short of food. They had to buy wheat or they would have starved. The price went up and the millers could no longer buy cheap wheat outside Ireland. They started to buy Irish wheat. Overnight they accepted wheat they had turned down before. This proves they were putting a quick one across the farmers, who were unprotected over the years.

I ask the Minister for Agriculture— he is new to the job—to take up the whole question of the millers in their relationship to the farmers and see that the farmers get fair play. I unhesitatingly say here, as the representative of a constituency that grows wheat, that the farmers have been openly swindled by the millers over the years. I know of many cases of people who sent two lots of wheat out of the same field to the same mill. One of them was turned down with an enormously high rate of moisture while the other was passed as millable. The first was sent when the world price of wheat had fallen and the millers were turning down wheat ad lib, but when they wanted to buy Irish wheat cheaply they could accept it as millable. I am also aware of the fact—not in one case but in 20 cases— that wheat turned down by the Irish millers was milled and turned into first-class bread in Irish houses. This shows that the Irish farmers have been totally exploited by this gang of financiers. Therefore, I ask the Minister now, and I am justified in doing so, to see that in future the millers will not be allowed to put it across the Irish farmers and to see to it that the farmers get the fair play to which they are entitled.

Mr. P.J. Burke

While a number of farmers have been treated generously by the millers, I want to agree with the last speaker that a number have been treated very badly. We have had a similar experience in my constituency. Two loads of wheat grown under the same conditions go out of the same field One is accepted and the other rejected. Then John Murphy brings the second load down again and gets it accepted. While the previous Minister for Agriculture met the farmers and did everything he could to remedy the position, there are certain loose ends to be tied up and I have no doubt that the Minister will go into this matter because it is most desirable that he should do so.

I want to refer to the position of dairy farmers in County Dublin. They are finding it very hard to get labour. A friend of mine told me that in order to get labour in County Dublin, he has to pay at least £12 a week to each worker. He is selling milk to the dairies here. The County Dublin milk producer is in a different position from that of the dairy farmer down the country. Whereas in the county about which the last Deputy spoke, it is only during the summer period they have milk production at all, in County Dublin our farmers have to feed their cattle the whole year round and feed them well or they will be prosecuted for selling milk deficient in fats. I would ask the Minister to have a look into that problem.

I was amused by some of the remarks made by Deputy Donegan. He said that from the £6,666,000 being voted, the farmer would not get any direct benefit. Let us deal, first of all, with the heifer scheme. The original estimate was for something like £400,000. It has gone up to £2,955,000. The Minister is asking for an additional sum of £2,550,000.

Mr. Donegan

The estimate was fairly well wrong.

Mr. P.J. Burke

It represents a subsidy of £15 for 130,333 calves. Is that not a direct subsidy to farmers? I was surprised that, even on that count alone, the heifer scheme was criticised as being of no use. As a result of this scheme, we have 130,333 more calves in the country and, as the Minister rightly stated, small farmers with one or two cows will benefit by it, too. If so many people had not benefited by the scheme, we would not be in the position in which, after scarcely a year, our calf population has gone up so much. In most counties where the scheme operates and where there are very few large ranches, surely the people who have benefited under this scheme are small farmers, having three or four cows, who have succeeded in getting another heifer or two. If they have two, on average, it will be a great encouragement and it will show also that people are anxious to do something to increase their cattle numbers. I want to say to Deputy Donegan——

Mr. Donegan

The Deputy's arithmetic is a little weak. He ought to do that division sum again. Divide 2,955,000 by 15 and what do you get?

Overall, however, there is a total increase of 97,500 in cattle numbers. Deputies have asked about the future of this scheme. They have asked if it does not appear that because we have had such a great flood of applications this year there is a possibility they will now dry up and we will not have anything like the same numbers in future. As far as I can see and estimate, there is no basis for any such suggestion. I mentioned that roughly 190,000 heifers will be covered by the scheme between now and the 31st March next. As far as we can anticipate, between cows and heifers, the numbers will go up by approximately 100,000 this year as a result of this scheme. As a direct result of this scheme we will have an extra 100,000 heifers. All the indications are that that figure will be more or less the same the year after.

The only reason I am coming in here looking for this couple of million pounds is because the scheme has been so successful. I am sorry to say that I cannot escape the conclusion that its very success is to some extent rankling Fine Gael Deputies bearing in mind what Deputy Dillon said about this whole idea of securing this target of output of cattle of one and half million by 1970. I want to describe briefly for Deputies how we think this heifer scheme is now fitting into the over-all target position as set out in the Brown Book. As Deputies know the Brown Book postulates an output of cattle of one and a half millions by 1970. That involves getting our cow numbers to somewhere in the region of 1,700,000 by 1968. In order to get the numbers up to that figure it postulates an increase of 400,000 in our cow numbers as compared with 1963. That, as you can establish from a mathematical calculation, means an average increase of 75,000 a year over the years 1963-68. The Brown Book stipulates an average increase of 75,000 cows per year. As far as we can see the calved heifer subsidy scheme has resulted, in its first year, in an increase of somewhere in the region of 100,000, so that to my mind it is fitting in very adequately with the over-all projection for the livestock industry.

Some Deputies said they did not like the scheme and would prefer to see a calf subsidy. I cannot understand why an intelligent Deputy like Deputy O'Donnell should come along at this stage, when we have clear-cut evidence of the success of the scheme, and say he does not like this particular scheme and would have preferred another. This whole matter was gone into minutely and carefully by the experts of my Department before the calved heifer scheme was introduced and the idea of a calf subsidy was examined very carefully indeed. In the end it was decided that we should have a heifer scheme rather than a calf subsidy scheme. In Britain they can have a calf scheme because they have records of a certain type. We have no records of calves but fortunately, because of the BTE scheme, we have records of cows and that was probably one of the main factors in favour of the heifer scheme. Added to this, as Deputies know, the manner in which our calves are distributed around the country is very complex and complicated and the opinion at the time, when the scheme was being introduced, was that it would be technically very difficult, if not impossible, to administer a calf scheme and when you had this ready-made machinery there to operate a heifer scheme, it was the obvious thing to do, and in the result it has proved itself to be so successful.

Most of the debate has of course centred around this question of the heifer scheme but some Deputies did raise other questions. I cannot understand Deputy O'Donnell's suggestion that the full 2d a gallon is not being passed on to the milk producers in some creamery areas with which he is familiar. Admittedly in any area creamery costs of production go up marginally but this could not possibly account for anything like the ½d mentioned by him. If Deputy O'Donnell wishes to give us some more information about that we will have it examined but as far as I know this 2d a gallon on milk was passed on directly for the benefit of the milk producer.

It was interesting to see the clash of opinion between Deputy M.P. Murphy and Deputy T. O'Donnell on this question of pigs. Deputy Murphy's fears in this respect are groundless. He seemed to suggest that large scale fattening operations are a bad thing for the small farmer because ultimately they will be competing with them for a restricted market. I think that is unreal. I agree with Deputy O'Donnell that the large scale, efficient fattening operation is a good thing and there will always be a place side by side with that operation for the small farmer who is keeping limited stocks. It is the job of the Pigs and Bacon Commission to see to it that whatever the output achieved, from whatever source, is sold. One of the heartening factors in the whole general situation at present is the success which both the Pigs and Bacon Commission and An Bord Bainne are achieving in export markets. Both of them are tackling their task very energetically and efficiently and achieving substantial results.

As we can see from the figures, we are providing a great deal of money to ensure that our products are disposed of abroad to the best possible advantage. That of course will continue, and indeed the operations of An Bord Bainne and the Pigs and Bacon Commission will have to be expanded from time to time as necessary to ensure that the output of both the dairying and pig industries is satisfactorily disposed of. Deputy Michael Murphy also asked if I would look at this question of island milk and of procuring for the islanders concerned the benefit of the milk subsidy. I undertake that I will look into this problem again. I understand that some investigations have been made in regard to the matter, as to the extent of the milk production on these islands and so on and I will look at it. I want to make this general statement in passing that I promise to look at any proposal and examine any scheme or suggestion which any Deputy puts up to me about any matters in the agricultural field because in this House amongst the Deputies there is a great wealth of knowledge and experience in agricultural matters and it would be very foolish of me, as Minister for Agriculture, not to avail of that knowledge and information to the greatest extent possible. I will be happy at any time to examine any proposal or suggestion put to me.

Deputy Esmonde spoke about beef and the long-term prospects for beef. I think we are proceeding along the right lines in this regard. The general policy for the livestock industry is fairly well laid down. I mentioned how we hope to increase cow numbers and the output of cattle within the context of the Second Programme for Economic Expansion. Deputies will have seen that we have arranged for the importation of French Charollais and Dutch Friesians, and we shall continue to endeavour by experimentation of this sort to improve the quality of our cattle in every possible way. There is a disease risk involved and we must take the most stringent precautions. In this way we propose to introduce here any strain which we think will be of value to our cattle industry, and which will help to improve the output of that industry.

We also hope to consideraby expand the campaign for the eradication of disease. As rural Deputies know, farmers lose a great deal of livestock through disease of one sort or another. Now that the bovine tuberculosis eradication campaign is coming to an end we hope to use the same machinery to launch an attack on contagious abortion and generally do everything we can to ensure an improvement in livestock output by eradicating diseases of one sort or another.

As I said earlier, our policy will be to try to improve grass husbandry, and to have the same amount of land carrying greater numbers of cattle. There is scope for great improvement here. By and large, I think our policy in regard to the cattle industry is proceeding satisfactorily, and should bring us satisfactory results by the time we get to 1970 and see how we have fared in the matter of achieving our targets.

Deputy Esmonde referred to the question of cream in County Wexford. The problem there is quite simple. For some considerable time my Department tolerated this business of farm separating of cream, but it is a bad thing. It is not modern farming; it is not good practice. In France, which Deputy Esmonde mentioned, my information is that the dairy people have a very big grouse because this unhygienic practice is permitted. I will undertake to look at the matter again, but looking at it superficially it seems to me inevitable that something would be done about it, and that we could not contemplate allowing the practice to continue indefinitely.

Deputy J. Brennan and Deputy Michael Murphy mentioned the small farmers, and in particular the small farmers in the western areas and along the western seaboard. I think there is general recognition of the fact that many of our small farms are not viable economic units, and do not provide the people who live and work on them with an adequate or satisfactory standard of living. There is quite a job to be done in that regard. In this connection I should like to mention the pilot areas now established in 12 counties. The experiments which are being carried out in those areas will have a great bearing on the steps we can take to bring up the income level of the small farmer. Again, of course, one of the most effective ways of tackling the problem of increasing the income of the small farmers is to have a greater use and exploitation of our advisory services. Probably the biggest single task that has to be undertaken at present is to get the farmers, particularly in the areas which have been referred to, to make more use of the existing advisory services and to avail of them to the full. If we can get that done, we will be making a very big contribution to the problems of the small farmers.

Dáil Éireann debate - Tuesday, 24 Nov 1964

Committee on Finance. - Vote 40—Agriculture (Resumed).

Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 24 Nov 1964