Creed urged to withdraw ‘smear’ allegation in Dáil

PAUL MURPHY TD SAYS HIS POSITION ON MEAT PROCESSORS VINDICATED BY COVID OUTBREAKS

LEFT wing TD Paul Murphy has fired a broadside at former Agriculture Minister Michael Creed, demanding that the Cork North West TD withdraw allegations that he had ‘smeared’ meat processors in the Dáil.

The RISE representative for Dublin South West and Michael Creed were involved in an exchange in the Dáil in April during which Paul Murphy said that meat processing companies were not driven primarily by the health and safety of their workes but by the ‘maximisation of their profits and sometimes workers’ health and safety can be sacrificed’.

In his response in the Dáil, the then Minister defended his department’s role in the protection of workers in meat processing companies from infection. “The import of the Deputy’s question seems to be that management in these companies would in some way jeopardise the ongoing production of their own plant operations.

“The primary concern in all of these cases is the safety of employees in plants and citizens in the country generally,” said Minister Creed. He added that there was nothing to suggest the allegation Paul Murphy was making, whether against those meat plants or any of the workplaces, was true.

“It is a smear tactic dressed up as concern, which is regrettable,” he said.

As meat processing plants in Kildare, Laois and Offaly have been the centre of the recent upsurge in COVID-19 infections, leading to a two week lockdown in those counties, a focus has come on the outbreaks in the plants during April and May.

“The complaints raised back in April by meat factory workers have been completely vindicated,” Deputy Murphy said this week. “The dangerous conditions in these plants was highlighted again and again by workers and amplified by myself and others in the Dail.

He claimed that calls for inspections, as well as proper health and safety measures were overlooked by government.

“Unfortunately, yet again the billionaire owners of these factories had more sway over government policy than the workers,” Deputy Murphy further claimed.

“I think he should withdraw that allegation. It’s not about apologising to me, but it is about admitting that he should have listened to the complaints coming from workers which I tried to highlight. His whole government turned a blind eye to what was going on, and the result is massive outbreaks. Hopefully, no one dies due to this light-touch approach by the government and the regulator.”