Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I want to come in on this because a few things need to be clarified. Over the past six or seven months vets have called meetings in hotels throughout the country. We see vets giving us biscuits and sandwiches and all different stuff while they tell us what is coming down the line. It was made very clear to farmers in many places throughout the country that vets would be calling out to the farms to decide what prescription would be needed. Has the Department made any allowance for this in the legislation? The answer is that it has not. Has it made any allowance for the farmers who will have to pay more money than previously? The signal being given out by the Department seems to be of a jolly thing of vets doing herd tests and when the farmers and vets are sitting in the jeep afterwards, when the farmers are giving the vets a few hundred euros for the herd test, they will say they want products for fluke or other issues for the year, the vet will write out the prescription and everyone will be happy. This is not how it will end up. Farmers are at the end of the barrel of a gun on this one. The vets will have the opportunity to screw farmers and that is the fact whether or not the Department wants to admit it. This is how the legislation is being written. Farmers throughout the country will be at the end of this stick with vets. It has already happened. I have seen the build up to this where vets are bringing people to hotels. I have never seen it previously and it has been happening over the past six months. They are getting farmers ready to bring them in.