asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries if he proposes to introduce any scheme in the near future to ensure that when beef prices and demand are depressed intervention prices or substitute aids for intervention prices will, in fact, reach the primary producer.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Beef Prices.
33.
The intervention prices relate to sales of carcase beef to the intervention agency and the prices paid for this beef are widely known. Over recent months beef sales to intervention and certification of other cattle for the present temporary slaughter premium have represented about two-thirds of total cattle slaughterings. It is normally a function of the commercial market for cattle, which is largely between farmers themselves, to have the benefits afforded by the support payments passed back through trade channels to primary producers. Trade competition does not, it has to be accepted, function with full effect in very weak national and international market conditions such as have prevailed for some time past. It is not easy to see, however, what official action can be taken to enforce any specific levels of price for sales of various types of cattle at various stages between farmers themselves and between farmers and others. Furthermore, some of these cattle will not ultimately be sold or be eligible for sale through the support systems at the slaughtering stage.
As the Deputy knows, I secured the agreement of the beef processing factories last October to announce minimum average prices for steer cattle on an increasing scale up to the end of January. The position is being kept under continual review and I will be ready to take any suitable and practicable action that may be open to me at any time.
Will the Minister agree that, in fact, this is the nub of the whole difficulty which has arisen in the cattle trade over the past few months? Will he also agree that it is absolutely essential that steps should be taken to see that if in future depressed markets arise the prices must get back to the producer? Will the Parliamentary Secretary also agree that in many cases the producer is now going out of business and in two years time there will be a scarcity of beef? Will he agree that now is the time to make decisions on this so that, in the future, producer farmers will not be faced with this situation? Irrespective of how difficult it is for the Minister and his Department to do so, it should be done.
I have no doubt that the statements made by Deputy Gibbons will be closely and carefully examined. Of course this is not a matter for the Department here. It is a matter for the Community. What the Deputy and others have in mind is to ensure that any other helps will find their way back to the producers but, in such cases, direct payment to the producers by the Department as the intervention agency would be possible only where intervention beef was purchased direct from producers by the Department. This, however, is not the case. The intervention arrangements provide for beef to be purchased by the Department in chilled or frozen carcase form which confines the system to purchases from meat factories. That is the reason why the moneys cannot be passed directly back to producers. While direct payments to producers are not feasible, it has been accepted that the intervention system has, throughout a long continuous period, now 16 months, of depressed markets, prevented cattle prices from being far worse than they have been.
Would the Parliamentary Secretary not agree that, on the face of it, it seems unrealistic that you are paying 35.4p intervention price to meet the supply figure while factories agreed to give 31p this month, 30p last month and 29p the previous month? With no change in cost, how could you agree to such a position, that they could vary by 1p per lb per month with no variation in the cost of production and as a result of that——
The Deputy is arguing rather than asking a question. Deputy Callanan wants to come in.
The Minister dealt with that question at some length here on Wednesday evening. The changing of regulations is an on-going process but they must be changed in conjunction with the other members of the Community and unilateral action is not allowed. The Minister has all these questions in mind and I can assure Deputies who are worried about the position posed in the question of Deputy Gibbons that any improvements or suggestions the Department think feasible will be made to the relevant authorities.
Surely the Parliamentary Secretary knows, even though he says it is not feasible, that it is feasible to pay those payments direct to the producer and that that is the only way they can get back to the producer? It is surely known when anything is paid through an agency it is the agency that collects and not the producer? That has been the case down through the years unless you pay direct to the person you wish the payment to reach.
Joining the Community was like a marriage and part of the marriage ceremony involves the phrase "for better or worse". We joined the Community for better or worse and we have to take the regulations we feel are undesirable as well as those that are to our advantage. As I have clearly indicated, the Community regulations preclude us from doing what is suggested by Deputy Gibbons and Deputy Callanan.
It is not in the Treaty of Rome.
I do not want to repeat the reasons I have already given.
The Chair is anxious to make some progress.
In his original reply the Parliamentary Secretary said they had succeeded in getting the minimum price agreeable to all the factories. Would he not agree that this was used by the factories to drop to the lowest price payable at that time and not to the highest price that was being paid? By the Government's own action they caused the factories to create more profits for themselves; they all dropped to the lower price at that time.
That is not the case as I mentioned in reply to a supplementary question. This matter was dealt with by the Minister on Wednesday evening and it does not arise directly from this question.
But they did drop to the lowest price.
I gather we are selling beef to Russia at a very low price. Would the Parliamentary Secretary not consider it advisable to subsidise the price of beef so that the Irish housewife——
That is a separate question.
The Minister compared our being in the EEC to a marriage. Would he not agree that some of our other partners in this marriage seem to have made a better deal regarding intervention prices finding their way back to the consumer or have adopted a better system than has been adopted here? When he referred to the "better or worse" arrangement, would he not agree that those countries seem to have come out better and that our farmers seem to have come out worse?
Personally, I agree entirely with the Deputy that we rushed—if I may use that word— farmers into the EEC without negotiating terms as favourable as we could have negotiated.
I am talking about last year.
(Interruptions.)
Order, please.
We rushed into this while other countries gave the regulation much more attention than we did and possibly the Deputy's Government did not do as much as it should have done in ensuring that the regulations drawn up by the Community or amended by them would suit our requirements. We have to accept the position as it is and it is our job as a Government and the Minister's job as a member of the Council of Ministers to try to change the regulations.
Seeing that the Chair has allowed the Parliamentary Secretary to broaden the scope of the question, I gather from his answer that he does not accept as his Leader accepted when hundreds of thousands of people in Ireland showed what they wanted——
We do accept it, without a doubt. I answered a supplementary question.
(Interruptions.)
You do not accept it. You are the wrong man to have there if that is the case.
Would the Parliamentary Secretary not agree that the EEC has fulfilled its obligation to the Community by providing an intervention price but that in fact, the breakdown has occurred from that point down to our producers? I think the Parliamentary Secretary will agree that this is an internal problem and it is not right to contend that it is the fault of our being in the EEC. We agree with him that we would be worse off if we were not in the EEC but the Parliamentary Secretary must see that the obligation to get the intervention price back to the producers lies with our Government?
And the Government are taking every step to ensure that is the case.
The Government are doing nothing. The housewife cannot buy beef.
(Interruptions.)