Protesting farmers warn of dysfunctionality in Stormont department

Farmers have said there is “institutional dysfunctionality” in the Stormont department responsible for agriculture.

The Ulster Farmers’ Union (UFU) stopped short, however, of calling for Daera (Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs) Minister Andrew Muir to resign after a controversy over the culling of more than 50 cows.

Hundreds of farmers protested outside Parliament Buildings while the minister gave evidence to his scrutiny committee about the row which has engulfed his department in recent weeks.

Farmers are angry at the shooting of the cows, which the department has said followed a court order against the cattle owner on animal safety grounds.

More than a dozen tractors parked outside Parliament Buildings and a number of MLAs gave speeches.

Several members of the UFU attended the committee meeting to listen to the minister.

UFU president John McLenaghan said they did not get the answers they were looking for.

He said: “We came here looking for answers. We sat for three hours in the committee room, and we came out bitterly disappointed.

“We got more confusion than we got clarity.

“There needed to be a recognition of the faults that were made, and there needed to be some contrition shown as to how we then move forward from this, because at some point, as an industry, we have to get past this, we have to get over the rage, we have to move forward.

“We have to make our industry better because of this. It’s hard to see that right now, but that’s what we need to do.

“And we didn’t hear anything in there today which reassures us that that’s going to happen, and that is extremely disappointing.” 

Mr McLenaghan described a death threat against the Daera minister as “deplorable”.

However, he criticised Mr Muir for not yet publishing the terms of reference of an independent review into the shooting of the cows near Fivemiletown in June.

He said: “We don’t know who’s going to be on that. Is it a panel? Is it an individual? What are they going to investigate?

“So those are answers we should have had before today.”

When asked if his organisation believed the minister should resign, Mr McLenaghan said it was not about individuals.

He added: “We look at other issues that we have seen as a farming industry with Daera, and what we look at when we start to look at those, we see what we identify as an institutional dysfunctionality within Daera.

“We see that in this instance, we see it around the nutrient action plan proposals, and we see it around many other issues.

“That dysfunction is something we need to address.”

The union last year passed a vote of no confidence in Daera over its handling of a number of issues.

Mr McLenaghan said it was “obvious things had gone wrong” in the shooting of the 51 cows in Co Tyrone.

He said: “We have to explore why that happened. We have to then understand how we can stop that ever happening again, and that’s about that’s about getting right into the nuts and bolts of how Daera operates.

“There has been a dysfunctionality for quite some time. We have seen it as an industry. This is just one manifestation of it. That is what we need to address.

“That’s the opportunity that we have now: is to look at that, to take that apart, to build it back better again, and support what is our largest single and most important industry.”