asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries if he will make a statement concerning the future catchment area and production role of the milk and chocolate crumb processing plant at Rathmore, County Kerry as envisaged by his Department.

56.

asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries whether it will be possible for creameries in south Kerry to retain all the skim milk not required by the producers during 1973; and the plans for the rationalisation of the creamery milk industry in south Kerry.

With your permission, a Cheann Comhairle, I propose to take Questions Nos. 55 and 56 together.

The owners of the Rathmore factory have informed my Department that they intend to extend their milk-drying facilities to a level which will enable them from early in the 1973 season to handle any surplus milk from the creameries in the area, including the Dairy Disposal Company's creameries in south Kerry.

As regards creamery rationalisation in the area I would refer the Deputies to my reply to questions by Deputy Spring on 16th November.

Since when did Rathmore come into the south Kerry area?

Long before Deputy John O'Leary won the by-election there.

This is an indication of the way in which Fianna Fáil carved constituencies. This is a serious question. What connection has Rathmore with the south Kerry area?

It is in the constituency.

A short while ago the Taoiseach was talking of the mid-Cork constituency. Is Rathmore in the mid-Cork or the south Kerry constituency?

"Surgeon" Boland put Rathmore in the south Kerry constituency.

Rathmore is in County Kerry and is in the south Kerry constituency. I did not have to go to UCD to find that out.

The Taoiseach is not standing idly by now.

It is partly in County Cork. It is on the border of each of the two counties but it has no connection with south Kerry.

Another variant.

All I can say to Deputy O'Donovan is that Rathmore will be capable of handling the surplus of milk from south Kerry.

And west Cork, too, I hope.