Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Martin Heydon has claimed that Sinn Féin is "whipping up" farmers about Bord Bia chair Larry Murrin.

In the Seanad this afternoon (Wednesday, February 4), Sinn Féin senator Joanne Collins said that the controversy over the Bord Bia chair has been "allowed to drift" for over two weeks.

"With every single day that passes the credibility of Bord Bia, and in turn, the credibility of Irish produce is at risk," she said.

Last month, Dawn Farm Foods of which Larry Murrin is CEO, confirmed that Brazilian beef accounted for 1% of its beef supply in 2025.

Farm organisations and some politicians have claimed that Murrin's business sourcing beef from Brazil is untenable with his role of chair of the body tasked with promoting Irish food.

Farmers

Senator Collins said that farmers are "reacting rationally and justifiably to the blatant double standards that are happening here".

"Conflict of interest rules are not box ticking exercises. They exist because you cannot credibly regulate, promote or oversee a sector while benefiting from practices that undermine it.

"When the chair's personal business model cuts across the very values that Bord Bia is meant to defend, that position becomes untenable, and there is no argument in that," she said.

Minister Heydon said that Senator Collins had produced no proof of a conflict of interest for Larry Murrin.

"Have Sinn Féin sought to get a briefing off the chairperson of Bord Bia, because you raised this point here, where you sully someone's name under the privilege of this house, with no proof," he said.

The minister said he was looking forward to debating a Sinn Féin motion on the issue in the Dáil tonight.

Contracts

Minister Heydon said that it is in Irish farmers' interest that the Irish food companies win international supply contracts.

He noted that these "highly integrated global, international deals" can include proof of alternative sources of supply in the event of a food scare.

"If a company and a client is insisting on 1% of produce to come from Brazil, but that facilitates hundreds of millions of euros worth of Irish farmers produce to be there.

"If this was about price, if this was about conflict of interest, it would be way more than 1% it's purely about proving contingency of supply," he said.

"We need to explain to our farmers, instead of the rhetoric of whipping them up and trying to jump on a bandwagon.

"We need to explain the integrated nature of international supply deals and how they benefit Irish farmers," the minister added.

Bord Bia

Senator Collins said that she has "no problem with Bord Bia", which she described as "an absolutely amazing state company".

"Without them, our farmers wouldn't be able to get into the markets they do. But without our farmers, Bord Bia wouldn't be there, because we have world class beef because of the standards we have to stick to.

"The 1% isn't going to make a difference to these farmers. It's the fact that you have a chair importing for his private business and trying to promote the Irish beef. There is a conflict," she said.

In response, Minister Heydon said: "Senator, the mask slipped, you let the cat out of the bag in your supplementary question there, because you alluded to the fact that it's not about the 1%, it's about optics".

"You don't care about the fact that you have sullied a man's name in here who has waived his [Bord Bia] fee and worked free, gratis, because he fundamentally believes in the important role that Bord Bia play as a matter of public service.

"He sees what its delivered for our farmers, for our agri-food sector, for the 1,000s of jobs there are in our processing industry.

"And for optics, let's just tear the house down. Let's whip up farmers rather than explain the thing to them, because you didn't want to know the detail here today," he added.