asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries the estimated increase in agricultural income in 1966-67 over and above 1965-66 likely to arise as a result of the Free Trade Agreement together with appropriate details.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Agricultural Income.
38.
I would refer the Deputy to my statement in this House on 5th January, 1966, and direct his attention also to the increases recently announced by the British Government in the guaranteed prices for cattle, sheep and lambs which further enhance the value of the Agreement to our farmers.
Surely the Minister knows after the debate this morning that, in fact, any benefits that may arise from the increased price for fat stock in Britain did not come to us as a result of the Free Trade Agreement but as a result of the 1948 Trade Agreement which related the price of store cattle to the price of British cattle.
If Deputy Dillon and Deputy Donegan repeat that often enough, they will begin to believe it themselves.
Is the Minister not able to give more details than he has given. I asked for the estimated increase in agricultural income. What the Minister did in his statement of 5th January and the other day was to give certain figures which he thought might possibly be affected. Can the Minister not give definite figures?
If the Deputy were as interested as he pretends to be, he would have been in the House this morning to hear my speech in which I gave precise figures for the items in question. I assumed that when I was making that information available to the House this morning, the Deputy would certainly be on hand to hear it and that it would be boringly repetitious to give it again.
You are terrific.
Apart from the fact that I spend more time in the House than the Minister or any of his colleagues, including the backbenchers, I should like to say that the information he gave this morning and on 5th January was just separate details. I want to know has he got any estimate of the overall increase. I do not want the increase for individuals but the overall figure.
The potential overall increase in the trade and the resulting benefits to our farmers if they avail fully of the opportunities will be enormous. I made it clear in my reply on 5th January that while I was trying to put some sort of a precise accountancy value on the immediate benefit arising out of the Agreement there was in addition the expansion of trade as a result of the Agreement which would confer benefits which I could not possibly estimate, but which would be enormous.
Enormous?
I said that it would depend on the extent to which the farmers availed of the opportunities opened up for them, and that I had every hope that they would fully avail of those opportunities.
Can the Minister explain why cattle are 10/- a cwt cheaper than they were 12 months ago?
That is wrong.
The Minister said there would be an increase in the price of cattle but it has not happened yet.
It has so.
Soothsayers and astrologers.
Order.
All this reminds me——
The Minister knows as much about the price of cattle——
Will Deputy Harte please cease monopolising Question Time?
——that Fine Gael did not even know when they were discussing the Trade Agreement that there is no guaranteed payments system for dairy products in Great Britain.
The rancher from Raheny.