Rural TDs need to ‘stand up and be counted’

A GALWAY IFA leader has called on Government rural TDs to ‘stand up and be counted’ in relation to the Dept. of Agriculture decision to send out TB ‘risk letters’ to farmers across the country.

Stephen Canavan, Galway IFA Animal Health Representative, told the Farming Tribune that the decision to send out the letters – at a time when there was no Minister for Agriculture in place – was ‘sneaky’ and a ‘cheap shot’ at farmers.

“The damage is done and the shot is fired – all we can do is to try and prevent the next one from going off. But why don’t our own rural Government TDs stand up for their own people – and do the right thing,” said Stephen Canavan.

He described the Department’s badger vaccination programme as ‘farcical and completely inadequate’ to deal with the core issue of the role of wildlife in the spread of bovine TB.

“If the best the Department can do, is to send out letters to farmers putting them into different risk categories, then we’re a long way off from resolving this issue. Farmers weren’t consulted on this – it was just ‘snuck’ in when there was no Minister in charge,” said Stephen Canavan.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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