Council passes motion calling on taoiseach to ask Murrin to step down

CARLOW Co Council unanimously passed a motion calling on the taoiseach, tánaiste and minster for agriculture to intervene and ask the chairman of Bord Bia, Larry Murrin, to step down from his role.

The motion was proposed at the Monday 9 February council meeting following an emergency meeting of the Carlow executive of the Irish Farmers Association (IFA) on Sunday 8 February in the Woodford Dolmen hotel.

Dozens of farmers and members from the IFA’s Carlow branch were present in the council chamber while the motion was being discussed.

All 18 councillors supported the motion, which was passed by a show of hands.

Fine Gael cllr Ben Ward, who proposed the motion, said the issue facing the government was “very simple” and that Mr Murrin had to be removed from his position.

“The head of Bord Bia was appointed by the minister for agriculture and the minister has the power now to remove him from the chair,” cllr Ward said.

Sinn Féin cllr Jim Deane, who is a sheep farmer and a Bord Bia supplier, said the situation was “disgraceful” and that Larry Murrin was “jeopardising the whole industry.” 

“It is an absolute disgrace that one man can jeopardise Bord Bia, which all farmers are very proud of and over the last 32 years have built up to produce safe food, not only for people in this country but right around the world,” cllr Deane said.

Independent cllr William Patton thanked the members of the IFA for their presence in the chamber and said that Mr Murrin had to be removed, adding: “I have a master’s degree in governance, but it doesn’t take a master’s degree to know when something’s wrong. It is plain and simple; you can’t be two sides of the same table.” 

Fine Gael cllr and mayor of Carlow Paul Doogue, who seconded the motion, said the issue was “black and white” and that he sent a notice to over 200 Fine Gael councillors asking them to notify their local TDs about the seriousness of the issue ahead of a planned vote in the Dáil on Wednesday.

“I sent word to 245 councillors last night asking them to get on to their TDs and ministers to try and put an urgency on this before it goes to a vote on Wednesday,” he said. “I wish the IFA the very best of luck and I think they know that they have all councillors’ support here,” he added.

Speaking to The Nationalist, former Fine Gael TD for Carlow and current representative for the county on the IFA national dairy committee, Pat Deering, said the IFA was happy with the result of the motion.

“We were quite happy with the meeting; there was unanimous support for the motion, which came about as a result of the IFA’s emergency meeting on Sunday night," Mr Deering said. 

The emergency meeting on Sunday night was attended by 15 of the 18 county councillors, with the three not in attendance sending their apologies, while Fine Gael TD Catherine Callaghan, Sinn Féin’s Natasha Newsome Drennan TD and Fianna Fáil’s minister of state Jennifer Murnane O’Connor were also present.

About 100 farmers were in attendance, with the main issue being that the IFA and its farmers have lost confidence in Larry Murrin because of what they believe to be a conflict of interest after it emerged that Murrin’s company Dawn Farms was importing quantities of Brazilian beef into Ireland.

“I have never seen as much anger and passion in a room,” said Mr Deering. 

“There were a lot of questions asked to elected representatives, a lot of disquiet, a lot of anger. There was also a lot of people who wouldn’t go to an IFA meeting at all, never mind on a Sunday night, but it just goes to show the level of anger and disquiet at the whole situation,” he added.

Councillors and TDs in attendance were all supportive of the IFA’s stance, which prompted the proposal that a motion would go before the council yesterday.

Catherine Callaghan, TD outlined what she had done to lobby behind the scenes for the duration of the dispute and that she was supportive of the IFA and farmers’ stance; however, she could not vote in support of the motion for fear she would lose the parliamentary party whip.

The same situation applied to minister Murnane O’Connor.

Both deputies said they would lobby behind the scenes continuously, with minister Murnane O’Connor stating that she would organise a meeting of all Oireachtas members in the constituency with the taoiseach in advance of the vote on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Natasha Newsome Drennan, who farms alongside her husband, said she would vote in favour of her party’s motion calling on the government to remove Mr Murrin from his post.

There were a lot of questions from the floor as to why government TDs were not going to support the farmers and the IFA, with deputy Callaghan and minister Murnane O’Connor criticised for their plans to obey the party whip and not stand by their principles.

In a recent interview with the Sunday Independent, Taoiseach Micheál Martin said the dispute had “gone too far” and warned that ongoing protests from the IFA and other farming groups risked sending the “wrong message globally” about Ireland’s food supply chain.

Both Micheál Martin and minister for agriculture Martin Heydon have expressed their full confidence in Mr Murrin.