A REFUSAL by the EU to cut the £100 million fines on Ireland for irregularities in the beef trade will seriously damage relations between the Government and the Commission, the Minister for Agriculture said.
Mr Yates added that a special committee had been set up to recover the fines from the meat companies involved, but there were legal difficulties because the ownership of several of the plants had changed.
He was speaking in Berlin yesterday after meeting the EU Commissioner, Mr Fischler.
The Minister said he was upset at the lack of progress in having the fines reduced. But even if the fines were not substantially reduced there would be no impact on the current Budget, because money had been set aside to meet the "disallowances".
"That is not in any way to concede that we owe the sums being demanded. But if we are fined, the money will be phased in over a number of years," he said.
Mr Yates was in Berlin for the official opening of Green Week, the largest consumer food fair in Europe, at which a strong Irish presence is co ordinated by An Bord Bia.
He said preliminary figures showed that the volume of Irish commercial beef sale's increased by 7 per cent, mainly in continental Europe, from £870 million in 1994 to £955 million last year.
According to Mr Michael Duffy, chief executive of the board, this was achieved despite difficult trading conditions. He said Irish pigmeat exports had increased by 20 per cent to £206 million in 1995.
Mr Phillip Lynch, chairman of Bord Bia, which was established a year ago to help Irish food companies to export, was critical of the public service recruitment embargo. He said it was impeding the work of the board: "We need at least 10 more key people to drive our sales forward."
He said, however, that over the year the targets set by the board were met and 1,000 new jobs had been created.
Mr Yates said the Government would be sympathetic to the special needs of the food industry. He also said he would reluctantly seek a return to EU beef intervention next week, if the EU did not restore export refunds to pre November levels. The cut in export refunds had led to a major drop in the price of beef.