I want to be clear that I believe this motion to be premature, not because questions about Bord Bia are unimportant, because they are, but because we, as elected Members of the Oireachtas, have well-established processes for accountability. Those process are already under way. A motion such as the one before the House is hasty, risks politicising a statutory body and undermines the very scrutiny we all claim to value. The chair of Bord Bia is due to appear before the Oireachtas agriculture committee tomorrow. I welcome the fact that he is engaging in this process. That is where these matters should be first examined. We should not rush to judgment until we have heard directly from the chair before the committee. That is not avoidance; it is due process. I believe that Mr. Murrin is due that process. Committees exist for a reason. They allow for detailed questioning, for evidence to be put on the record and for members to engage in structured and informed ways. By contrast, a motion brought to the floor of this House before that engagement has taken place risks replacing scrutiny with speculation. Bord Bia is a statutory agency that has a crucial role to play in supporting Irish food and drink producers, promoting our exports and safeguarding Ireland's reputation in international markets. Decisions taken lightly or rhetoric deployed prematurely can have real consequences not just for board members or the Minister, but also for the farmers, processors and workers across the country. That is why timing matters and hearing from the relevant people also matters. That is why I am concerned about the approach surrounding this motion. Accountability must never become a proxy for pressure or intimidation. If we are serious about governance, we must also be serious about fairness and process. In that context, I want to address what happened today with the occupation of Bord Bia's offices. That occupation of the offices puts Bord Bia staff in a difficult position. These are workers; they are not decision-makers. They do not set policy and should not be placed in harm's way because of political or sectoral disputes. Whatever concerns people have, they are entitled to raise them. However, there are appropriate forums for doing so and the staff who come to do their jobs should never feel intimidation in their workplace. Bord Bia is governed by a board, but it is important to note - and this is sometimes overlooked - that the board delegates specific functions relating to particular sectors to subsidiary boards, as provided for under legislation. Under section 13(1) of the Bord Bia Act 1994, subsidiary boards can be established for defined sectors, including meat and livestock. These subsidiary boards have specific responsibilities and remits within the overall structure of Bord Bia. It is, therefore, worth putting on record that the chair is not a member of any of the subsidiary boards, including the meat and livestock board, established under this section of the Act. That distinction matters. If we are going to have a serious discussion about governance, responsibility and oversight then we must be grounded in the actual statutory framework, not assumptions and headlines. That is precisely why the agriculture committee tomorrow is the correct forum at this stage. It allows members to interrogate those structures, understand who is responsible for what and assess whether changes are needed based on evidence rather than conjecture. None of this is to suggest that Bord Bia should be beyond criticism. No public body is, but criticism must be informed, proportionate and timely. Tabling a motion in the House before the relevant committee has even met the chair risks undermining our credibility as legislators. We should allow the chair to appear tomorrow, listen carefully to what he has to say, test him through questioning and then decide collectively what, if any, further action is warranted. That is how accountability is supposed to work. To do otherwise is to leap ahead of that process and is not what is needed. For those reasons, this motion is premature. I urge colleagues, particularly ahead of tomorrow's discussions, to allow for proper scrutiny mechanisms to their jobs. This debate distracts from core agricultural issues the country faces. Whether the chair goes or stays, we will still face these bigger outstanding issues which need attention. While we squabble over the chair, beef prices are up 25%, families are struggling to feed themselves and farmers cannot survive on what they earn. That is the real headline and what should be in the media.

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