An opposition motion of no confidence in the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, was defeated in the Dail last night.

During the debate, it was claimed that a senior Department of Agriculture official, who was prosecuted in the courts last week, had been reinstated by Mr Walsh following representations by former minister Mr Ray Burke.

Labour's enterprise, trade and employment spokesman, Mr Pat Rabbitte, claimed that the official, who was convicted of selling health certificates, got back into the department having left it years earlier because of representations by Mr Burke.

Speaking on a Fine Gael motion of no confidence in the Minister, Mr Rabbitte said that the plan to reinstate the official was "hatched" in Clontarf rugby club by Mr Burke and a serving department official.

They agreed terms to be put to the Minister, and Mr Walsh went against advice to impose the officer on the north-east division.

The Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, said the farmers' confrontation with the meat factories should never have happened, but the Minister sparked it off by increasing veterinary fees.

Mr Walsh was making no attempt to manage changes which would occur with the dramatic fall predicted by Forfas in the number of people working in fulltime farming by 2015. "He is not doing anything to ensure that Irish farming survives. He does not want to offend anyone, so he does nothing."

Farmers and food processors "deserve honest leadership - a leadership that seeks to master the forces of change, rather than just ignores them, and focuses exclusively on crisis management".

The party's agriculture spokesman, Mr Paul Connaughton, said that if anyone deserved to be moved in the Cabinet reshuffle it was Mr Walsh. His "ineptitude and lack of political judgment and the damage it precipitated in the Irish beef industry, make him unsuitable to continue in his ministerial office".

He added: "I believe that the Minister for Agriculture has passed his sell-by date. He is too long around Agriculture House and is too dependent on civil servants and does not possess the flair, capability or understanding necessary to keep apace with a fast-changing industry."

Labour's agriculture spokesman, Mr Willie Penrose, said the Minister was the catalyst for the cattle prices confrontation and was ham-fisted in dealing with it.

"It has been an awful chapter in Joe Walsh's tenure in the department. He bears a significant responsibility for the bitterness, hardship and anger that has flowed from this dispute. Over the past few weeks thousands of workers have been laid off and important beef contracts have been jeopardised."

Mr Walsh said mistrust between the producers and processors was at the core of the dispute. This was deep-seated and fuelled regularly by allegations of excessive profiteering by the meat factories. The investigation by the Competition Authority into cartel-type activities was continuing and was in effect a criminal investigation and a high level of proof was required.

Mr Walsh said his department had co-operated fully with the authority and supplied it with all information available, particularly in relation to prices paid by individual meat plants. "Should evidence of anti-competitive practices be uncovered, the Government will take whatever steps are necessary to terminate them," he said. He was "pleased to defend my role in the beef dispute and my record as Minister".

He was defended by the Minister for Health, Mr Cowen, who said it was "facile and idiotic" for the Opposition to claim that Mr Walsh was the problem in farming and it insulted the intelligence of people working in the industry to say that.

The Government defeated the motion by 70 votes to 66.