Mick Clifford: Farmers should be wary of overplaying their hand

The protest at Bord Bia's offices has all the signs of farce, writes Mick Clifford

Members of the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) protest inside Bord Bia headquarters in Dublin, as part of the dispute over the agency’s leadership. Picture: Leah Farrell / © RollingNews.ie

Will the Ballsbridge Five ever be freed? Will it take hell to freeze over before they can emerge into the light, arms raised aloft in victory?

Right now, the omens are not good for the Ballsbridge Five. The stakes are high, their resolve assured, but, really, the world appears to be spinning away, increasingly oblivious to whatever cause the captives are espousing.

The five are occupying the offices of Bord Bia in the salubrious Dublin suburb. They have but one demand. The chair of the food agency Larry Murrin must resign. His sin was to import Brazilian beef, which apparently accounts for about 1% of beef used in the businessman’s extensive operation. His reasoning for buying the beef is that it was for contingency planning. For this, the famers, or at least some of them, are insisting he must go in the name of justice and fairness. The government is adamant that Larry ain’t going nowhere.

As such, the campaign to dislodge him has taken on a significance bigger than the issue itself. Hold it up to the light and this episode may well be an Alamo for the power of farmers to dictate public policy

The five swooped into the building on February 3. For a week before that the protest was confined to the streets outside, where kindred spirits still turn up every day.

They got as far as reception, sat on the floor and unfurled their blow up beds. This week, the Farmer’s Journal obtained an exclusive report from the citadel.

One of the five, Teresa Roche, told the paper that despite restricted access to food and power, they are “healthy, fit and mentally strong”.

“We have heat, we have some food — albeit only allowed in at 10am and 5pm,” she said. “We’ll gladly stay for as long as it takes.”

Another, Tom Byrne, was described as a “Wicklow farmer and diabetic”.

26/02/2026 Dublin, Ireland. Tom Byrne from Wicklow at the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) protest inside Bord Bia headquarters in Dublin.

Says he: “We went thirty-six hours without any food supply. I was escorted down to a room on my own to eat something during this time. I was made finish what I got I front of a security guard — in case I’d bring it back to the rest of them”. 

Intentionally of otherwise, Mr Bryne’s description of conditions echoes with what might be expected in gulag.

Another of the five, Patrick McCormick, was described as “lying on the floor” in the building “and says he will remain there until a new chair is put in place”. In the interim, one hopes he snaffles a chair to sit in so he can get up off the floor.

The whole farrago has all the signs of farce. Yet among farmers, there is huge support. Every day, by rota, others show up outside the office building to demonstrate solidarity. Around the country, the IFA’s version of monster meetings have been held, attracting crowds of up to 800, to lend their support.

At these meetings, a video link is established with the Five where conditions inside the citadel are discussed. Once the link lights up, the assembled gathering get to their feet and applaud the besieged, their sacrifice, and the principled stance they are taking in the name of fighting injustice.

A Red C poll in the Business Post last weekend found that 53% of adults said Mr Murrin should go, and only 16% that he should stay. It is unclear how many respondents knew who the chair of Bord Bia is, what he has done and whether Brazil was better known for its football or beef.

The dispute began after it emerged last month that Bord Bia Chair Larry Murrin's company Dawn Farms has been importing Brazilian beef.

The view of the IFA is that there is a big principle at stake here, and the rage being expressed by its members is justified. In recent decades farmers have been subjected to a voluminous amount of regulation. Bord Bia oversees much of the paperwork mountain. This has undoubtedly been an administrative burden. The farmers are angry that what is apparently sauce for the goosed farmers is not sauce for the gander, Murrin.

Around 90% of Irish agrifoods are exported so why there should be such a hullabaloo about a small amount coming in the other direction is curious.

It is also the case that the revelation that Mr Murrin was in bed with the Brazilians came around the time of huge publicity over the fate of the Mercosur trade deal. Ireland voted against the deal, despite it being considered to be in the country’s best interests. This was because the deal provides for the import of a small amount of Brazilian beef, a complete no-no for the beef farmers in this country.

Mercosur will most likely go through anyway, but there will be a cost to the government’s kowtowing to farmers for the sake of optics.

There was another recent issue on which the farmers also managed to have their way, arguably in opposition to the national interest. Late last year, Ireland received a further three-year derogation from the EU’s Nitrates Directive, which is designed to improve water quality.

The directive requires the reduction of pollution with nitrates from agricultural sources. Farmers pleaded that to comply would be crippling financially so the government got a pass on this one until 2029. It is reasonable to assume that water quality will therefore not be as good as it should or could be for the next three years.

Farming is not an easy life. As a sector it has gone through tough times and is often pitted at the frontline in the battle against climate change. The caricature of the farmer caring not a whit about the climate and its impact on the environment is way off the mark.

The recent victories with Mercosur and the Nitrates Directive demonstrate how the farming lobby has retained the capacity to influence the body politic in a sophisticated and effective manner.

But now a question arises as the whether the lobby, including the IFA, has overplayed its hand. 

The fate of Murrin personally is not the issue here. Instead the question being asked is whether farmers should be allowed to dictate policy to an extent that might echo from decades past

Vested interests have always had an outsized role in dictating public policy in this country. Publicans, for instance, were once expert at having their interests supercede those of the general public, particularly in areas like drink driving. Then they overplayed their hand and their influence these days is hugely reduced.

What's your view on this issue?

You can tell us here

Farmers might want to take note. There is only so much kowtowing that any government, or the body politic, can manage without looking weak and even pathetic. For that reason, in the wake of the directive derogation and Mercosur, the government may be feeling a little tender, or precious, and in no mood to react with Pavlovian urgency when the farmers bark.

Or maybe not. Maybe there is life in the old dog that is the farmers political power. Maybe this government can be forced into one more U-turn. In the meantime, the Ballsbridge Five are continuing to fight the good fight. They might be there a while. For ultimately, one side in this dispute is going to end up in a bad way and things will never be the same again.