Fodder assistance scheme
Senator O’Neill defends the Government’s fodder response, including a €1 million transport subsidy, Departmental assistance and a hotline for farmers facing animal-welfare emergencies.
I will have a question for the Leader in a second on this crisis. The problem is that last summer we could not make fodder and it had to be imported from England. It is now being imported from France.
The Minister did announce a fund of €1 million to subsidise the cost of transporting this feed into the country. If Senator Leyden knew anything about it-----
Comment on this
I do not need a debate because it has been debated by an Oireachtas joint committee and in the House. The local IFA branches have been proactive, along with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, regarding the matter. There is a Freefone number that can be called, 1850 211 990. If anybody cannot source fodder or pay for it, the Minister gave an undertaking at the meeting of the Oireachtas joint committee and in the Dáil that his Department will pay in order that no animal starves. It is important that the general public is made aware of the Freefone number.
We have again listened to populist politics. I ask the Leader to ask the Minister for Finance to come here to explain why we need a property tax. After listening to the Opposition at the weekend at its Ard-Fheis, one would wonder how the leopard has changed its spots so much.