Representatives of farmers owed up to £3 million €3.8 million) by the Tralee Beef and Lamb Company, were last night meeting the receiver appointed to the company by Anglo Irish Bank, Mr Michael Daly. Eighty workers, two understood to have been shareholders, lost their jobs after the company collapsed on Tuesday.

Up to £1 million is thought to have been invested in the firm under the Business Expansion Scheme. Mr Daly, from chartered accountants Grant Thornton in Limerick, did not know the firm's debt nor the scale of deficiency.

He also met a solicitor, a sub-committee representing the workers, who are not members of any union, and Mr Alan O'Connell, who was financial controller of Tralee Beef and Lamb. Mr O'Connell was representing Mr John Delaney, a former AIBP executive, who has operated the plant since acquiring it from the Garvey family. No meeting with Mr Delaney had been arranged.

The leaders of the Irish Farmers' Association and the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association, Mr Tom Parlon, and Mr Pat O'Rourke, met farmer creditors at separate meetings in Tralee yesterday and also met the receiver.

Mr Flor McCarthy, chairman of the Kerry county executive of the IFA, said at least two farmers were owed more than £50,000 each. Others were owed £20,000 to £30,000. Several hundred farmers had not been paid for cattle supplied for the last six to eight weeks and some had not been paid since July. "The plant can't be reopened or resold until farmers have been paid, " he insisted.

Mr McCarthy could not understand how farmers would allow a company to pay so long after supplying animals since most farmers insisted on payment on the day.

He said the farmers had sympathy for the workers, who declined to talk to The Irish Times. "The workers were badly caught," he said.