REACTION:FINE GAEL agriculture spokesman Donal Creed has written to the Dáil Agriculture Committee, asking it to hold an investigation into the monitoring systems in the animal feed industry.
Mr Creed welcomed the deal agreed between the pork industry and the Government which allowed the resumption of processing, but he said there were serious questions for the Government arising from the crisis.
"The whole sorry saga highlighted multiple system failures, all of which trace back to the Department of Agriculture. Significant questions have emerged on a number of issues," he said.
He listed these as traceability, monitoring of licensed premises and the proportionality of the response to the original contamination. "I am writing to the chairman of the Agriculture Committee, asking that the committee suspend all other business so that we can analyse the system failures that have been exposed in the management of this crisis.
"The Minister has serious questions to answer on this. Traceability was sold to the industry on the basis that it delivered the capacity for a forensic recall of contaminated product," he said.
"This regrettably has been exposed as a lie. The Department of Agriculture also failed to adequately monitor facilities licensed by it or indeed to carry out the required tests at such facilities.Clearly the Minister and senior officials in his department have to account for these manifest system failures," he concluded.
Irish Cattle and Sheepfarmers Association president Malcolm Thompson called on the Government to refocus its regulatory efforts outside the farm gate. "I am very alarmed at the fact that Minister Sargent has admitted that the Millstream plant had not been inspected in 2008 until the crisis emerged," he said.
"The Minister outlined that animal feed was being monitored on-farm. This is too little, too late and it's hitting the wrong target. The farmer purchases feed in good faith from licensed providers and must have an expectation that the feed is safe," he went on.