Farmers ramp up beef price protest in Dublin

Dublin city centre has been brought to a standstill as hundreds of farmers took part in a protest over beef prices.The “tractorcade” protest made its way into Dublin on Wednesday afternoon in a bid to highlight low prices for beef farmers.Christopher Duffy, from Co Meath, accused gardai of splitting the protest up as a number of farmers in tractors were prevented from accessing St Stephen’s Green from the Merrion Square area.Mr Duffy said: “We had an arrangement made with the gardai that we would come in and do a protest today. They are after dividing us up now – they are trying to divide and concur. Half of our protest is stuck beside Merrion Square held back by steel fences."Peadar Toibin, leader of Aontu, addressed the farmers saying it was a “disgrace” that Government was allowing farmers to bring their beef to the process gates for below price.