I support the Bill. I have known the Minister of State a good while, but whoever wrote his speech has never pulled a calf or brought lambs. I will tell him one thing; you would wonder what we are listening to compared with what we are talking about. He talked about the CAP strategic plan. The fact about the new CAP and Food Vision 2030 is that at this moment, farmers around the country are facing a 24% cut to their CAP payments. How will that protect the family farm? The Minister of State talked about well-being. The average age of farmers today is 59. Most farmers out in the rain, snow or sun are on their own. Generally, the only person they see is the postman. We talk about well-being. What have we done for them when it comes to their well-being? How do we encourage young people in when we look at what Europe is doing? Europe has decided that it will give Denmark the go-ahead, as I mentioned earlier, to get €1 billion together to get Johnny, Ludovic or whatever his name is off the farm and pay him, but he has to sign a docket that he will never farm in Europe again. He can go to Canada or Brazil, but he cannot farm in Europe. The same has happened in Holland. The nature restoration law is up in the air at the moment. We heard on day one that the State was going to be able to cover all the requirements. I have a question as to that, but I will not make a rash statement. We talk about getting youngsters in, but if we had such good plans on the farms, and if Food Vision 2030, or 2020 or 2010, worked, would we be down 100,000 sheep? Would we be down 274,000 suckler cows in ten years? When we look at the stats, does it not tell us that the age profile is 59 and suckler cows will be down 250,000? Yet, we still go on with our heads buried in the sand believing everything is hunky-dory. The new CAP strategic plan - there will be a bit of toing and froing - will decrease by 24%. The poor old farmer in the west of Ireland is getting €4,000 or €5,000, if it is reduced. Is the next generation going to come on stream, particularly with the opportunities that are there at the moment? Do we not look at the third leg of the stool, as I always do? If you are brought up on a small farm, in some counties at least, you might be able to build a house on the land, although some, with the way planning is going at the moment, are blocking that. You might be able to build a house. In fairness, if you have the site, you will build a house. For someone trying to buy a house in Dublin, it is €500,000 at the moment for what we call half a house compared with some of the houses we are looking at. If you get a job locally and, between the two legs of the stool, you do not need as big an income from one or the other, you will survive and make a living between the land and the job. You work hard but it is probably the greatest life you will ever have. There are times you are frustrated with it, but it is a great life to have, if you can make it work. The knock-on effect of that, and this is where the rural economy has to be looked at, is a few people are employed in the local shop. As outlined by Deputy Kenny, there is also the local GAA club and local community centre, and there might be a local pub. If you build a rural economy, where Google, Intel and all these big guns do not exist, money circulates in that rural area and it brings prosperity, but what are we doing? The nature restoration law is about re-wetting some parts of the land. I listened to the Minister of State. He used the words "environment" and "climate" seven or eight times. This is about farmers. It is about farmers not diversifying but coming to the land, be they lady farmers or male farmers. If we look at what we have done, the stats will tell you it is backwards we have gone on age profile and in trying to get youngsters into farming. We need to encourage that or we will be in trouble. We are looking at youngsters and talking about generational renewal. If you had 30 or 40 acres one time, you need more now. There is no doubt about it. Can you get that more, however? It is hard done when you go in as a young farmer. It is hard done when the solar company is trying to put solar panels on the fields beside you when it is for sale, or the wind turbine fella that is owned by a foreign company is trying to put wind turbines in another field, or the forestry companies - the vultures we decided we would bring in from England - come from another place and start bidding against you. It is not simple. We saw what happened in Leitrim. We see the number of trees that have been put into the likes of Leitrim. I know a certain number of trees are wanted, but where there are trees, whether we like it or not, there will not be houses, farmers, sheep, cattle, horticulture or whatever. There will be the sawmill, which gives employment, but look at the ratio of it. If we were doing everything so right in the whole of Europe over the last 15 years, why have 5.5 million farms been shut down? That is a queer figure. It is 5.5 million probably multiplied by 2.5; when we are doing an election that is how we tally up how many are in a house. It is 12.5 million people who are now not in farming. That should ring alarm bells for us that we need a commission. We can follow the European project. They are the whiz-kids. They want us to get rid of steel and bring in most of our products. Do you know why? Climate was mentioned many times, but it is that they want us to tick this box that we are the best kids in the world. This is so we can tell America, China and everyone else, but at the end of the day it is about pounds, shillings and pence. How do we build a rural community? Is there an agenda to drive everyone to the city? All I can see in parts of this country is a certain number of farms that are getting bigger and bigger. The average suckler herd is probably 18 or 20 cows but many farms now have 5,000 to 9,000 cows. These are not family farms and I do not care who argues otherwise. We are letting this happen and forgetting the people who lived in the rural areas. Every one of us here comes from an area of family farms, small farms. We never grew up with much but we always had enough. We built the communities in our areas. Community centres were built, as were football pitches. There was a meitheal of people. While education is very important, I fear the consequences if we do not put a floor under family farming to make it attractive for lads and girls to go into farming, and if they keep hearing about cuts and various things blocking them from farming. If you rewet your land, you do not need to live in the area. You can live in Dublin and can get your cheque if you want. If you have forestry on your land, you can live in America if you want. This is what we must consider. Are we going to try to keep the rural areas populated? This is bigger than just farming. The rural economy, which every one of us knows, is built around it. I encourage the Government, Teagasc and all the so-called experts who believe in visions and whatever to reconsider the vision they have had since 2010. They will need to get glasses to look at it and rethink the policy.

Sentiment score: 0.06