Pressure on Taoiseach to intervene in collective-agreement saga

Pressure on Taoiseach to intervene in collective agreement saga


Anton McNulty

HUNDREDS of hill farmers marched on Enda Kenny’s constituency office last Friday to demand he intervene on rules governing entry to the GLAS environmental scheme. If he does not, he will be responsible for ending a way of life in hill areas, they say.
The rally was the latest in a series of large-scale demonstrations and meetings that hill and commonage farmers have organised over the last number of months. The farmers want the collective-agreement criteria for joining the GLAS scheme to be scrapped. They say the criteria is unworkable and in effect prevents them from accessing the scheme.
Friday’s protest began in MacHale Park, wound its way through Castlebar and ended with a rally outside the Taoiseach’s constituency office on Tucker Street. Some organisers estimated that close to 2,000 took part.
A letter of protest, which was handed into the Taoiseach’s office, was read out by Colm O’Donnell of the Hill Farmers’ Action Group.
“The measures proposed by your Minister for Agriculture, Mr Simon Coveney, are totally unworkable, and if you don’t intervene on our behalf, you An Taoiseach and your Minister and your Government will be the cause of the end of the way of life in the hills and the end of rural tourism in hill areas,” he read.
“We as citizens of the state and custodians of the hills will not be denied our rights and freedom to farm our land and we will not be accepting collective agreement,” he said to a roaring cheer from the crowd.
A delegation of hill farmers met with Minister Coveney in Dublin last Wednesday. However, they were given no commitment that collective agreement would be discarded. Martin Gavin, a former Chairman of Mayo IFA told the rally that Minister Coveney was looking down his nose at hill farmers and it was time the Taoiseach delivered for them.
“What we have here is the worst Minister for Agriculture, from the point of view of small farmers, we have ever had. The Minister does not understand the area we come from, and what more he does not care. He is standing there looking down his nose at people in hill areas. We have a Taoiseach in this county and he was given a serious mandate in Mayo, and it is time he and his three TDs start to deliver for us,” he said.
The meeting was also addressed by a number of politicians, including MEPs Ming Flanagan, Marian Harkin and Matt Carthy; Mayo TD Dara Calleary; Fianna FΡil Agriculture Spokesperson Éamon Ó Cuív; and Mayo County Councillor Michael Holmes. All spoke in favour of the scrapping of collective agreement and gave their support to the actions of the hill farmers group.
Cllr Michael Holmes said hill farmers were being asked to apply for GLAS with one hand tied behind their back. Without GLAS ‘they are gone’, he said.
“The first time I became disillusioned was last Wednesday, when there was no movement from a Minister who does not understand. It is the first time in many years as a hill farmer that I can smell the end of the road for hill farmers. It will be a sad sad day if a Minister will preside over the ending of a tradition of farming in the west, where his boss is living. If they preside over this it is an awful indictment of this government,” he said.
MEP Marian Harkin said that collective agreement was an option but not a requirement from the EU. She said she believed the Minister could do a deal with the farmers.
The leadership of farming organisations was again criticised at the rally, with Colm O’Donnell saying it should be ashamed of itself for not attending the rally and supporting  fellow farmers.
The rally was also told that closing the Greenway to the public was not something that farmers wanted to do, but that without goodwill, it remained an option.