Coughlan heckled at ploughing ceremony

MIDLAND beet farmers heckled Agriculture and Food Minister Mary Coughlan when she officially opened the 75th national ploughing championships in Carlow and forced her to cut short her address.

Farmers, angered at the closure of the sugar beet factory in Carlow, carried placards saying Mary Coughlan, bad for Agriculture’, and ‘Coughlan’s legacy — no beet, no ploughing, no slurry, no dung, no tillage farmers’.

Ms Coughlan said she was disappointed by the “unmannerly protest”. She said she had agreed the rates for the sugar beet compensation being incorporated into the single farm payment. This was worth approximately €123 million to beet growers over the next seven years.