Representatives from four farm organisations will come before the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine this evening to discuss the eradication of TB.

The meeting will begin at 5:30p.m and will take place in Committee Room 3 of Leinster House.

Representatives from the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA); the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA); the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers’ Association (ICSA); and Macra na Feirme will be in attendance.

The meeting can be viewed live on Oireachtas TV.

The Joint Oireachtas Committee has 14 members; nine from the Dáil and five from the Seanad. It is chaired by Fianna Fáil Tipperary TD Jackie Cahill.

The TB Eradication Programme has long been a thorny issue, with restrictions on farmers and levels of compensation being long-standing concerns of farm organisations.

Just last month, the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers’ Association (ICSA) said that “bureaucratic barriers” were preventing farmers with TB-restricted herds from buying in cattle.

As well as that, the association is also opposing pre or post movement testing being imposed on farmers unless the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine commits to paying for them.

Hugh Farrell, the ICSA animal health and welfare chairperson, said at the time: “[We are] opposing the imposition of pre or post movement testing in relation to TB-restricted farmers buying in cattle for further feeding until we have certainty that the department will pay for these tests.”

He noted that farmers who “did not have feedlot status” in the past were prevented from buying in cattle while restricted until such a time as they have a clear test.

“With a lot of pressure, a recent change to rules has allowed TB-restricted farmers to buy in cattle. Unfortunately this has been complicated by the addition of extra paperwork and possible additional testing requirements in respect of animals being moved in,” Farrell noted.

He added that the ICSA was also concerned about bureaucratic requirements that are making it difficult for farmers to buy in stock for finishing, such as being asked to provide complicated documentation of where badger sets are located.