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Mrs. Liddell: I am grateful to the Minister. He must therefore tell the House why the concept has not so far been acceptable and what amendments have been made to make it acceptable. The ostrich-like attitude adopted in these matters shows a poor understanding of negotiation and a poor recognition of the scale of the problem and the need to move with speed. The attitude characterises the Government's behaviour since BSE was discovered in the 1980s. There must be a more responsible and serious attitude taken, not only by the Government but by Government Back Benchers, to the lifting of the European ban.
I am conscious that a substantial number of my hon. Friends and others want to speak, so I shall not take up the time of the House unnecessarily. Will the Minister give attention to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East on beasts born after the ban? My hon. Friend has tried to make a constructive point on the anxiety felt about the fact that 67 per cent. of identified BSE cases have been found in beasts born after the ban. My hon. Friend asked the Ministry for an inquiry to seek the sources of the feed that may have been contaminated. I suspect that the Government, beleaguered on all sides, thought that that was an unhelpful suggestion, but in fact it was extremely helpful. If we had an inquiry, which need take no more than two to three months, it might be possible to trace the sources of the feed that contaminated the system.
I do not suggest that contaminated feed is still going into the system, but, like my hon. Friend, I ask the Government to reconsider their opposition to his suggestion. I believe that if they did, it would help the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food when he goes to the negotiations. It would show that the Government had a commitment and a determination to seek every possible route to eradicate the difficulties.
The chaos over the past few weeks, with the introduction of the slaughter policy, has revealed an obvious lack of co-ordination that has been witnessed throughout the United Kingdom. I do not apologise for making a specifically Scottish point here. The industry in Scotland has its own liaison procedures, and it is obvious
that there is no mirror image of those within government. Is there not a case for the Government to approach those within the industry who are responsible for co-ordinating its activities, to seek their advice and, through them, to try to achieve better co-ordination in the slaughter policy? That would be a meaningful step forward.
Quality assurance is important, too. We in Scotland, like the Irish, the Welsh and the people in many parts of England, are proud of the fact that we can put a quality label on our product--Scotch beef. We have a voluntary quality assurance scheme. I accept that that in itself is not adequate for the scale of the problem that confronts us now, but when my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton and I met the Secretary of State for Scotland two months ago, we asked him to examine whether the voluntary scheme could be used as a framework to allow a more formal scheme to be put in place quickly. The right hon. Gentleman undertook to think about that option as soon as possible. Yet when he addressed the Conservative conference in Aberdeen at the weekend, we found out that he had not even begun to consider it.
Quality assurance is vital. In Scotland we are very conscious that one of the key marketing elements at the heart of all our products--not only Scotch beef but Scotch whisky and the other quality products that we supply to the European and international market--is quality. Scotland, the brand, is important to us. I regret that the Secretary of State did not take our helpful suggestion on board, and I repeat it tonight in the hope that, although no Scottish Office Minister is here, one of them or one of their officials may get round to reading Hansard tomorrow.
When Scottish farmers visited the House yesterday, it was obvious that the Government's inaction, and the apparent confusion and chaos, had caused great disappointment. Farmers wanted to make people aware of the full impact of that chaos on the beef and livestock industry. Yet they found a Government committed not so much to action as to alibi. Passing the buck has become the order of the day--but this is too important an issue to pass the buck on.
I believe that yesterday's employment figures were the first taste of trouble to come for everyone in the Scottish economy because of what has happened with BSE. Tragedies such as those of T and T Meats and Leslie's, both in Aberdeen, and those of all the other companies the length and breadth of Britain, are personal tragedies that cannot easily be overturned. People do not want sympathy; they want a sign that the Government are seriously taking on board the problems likely to be created.
In the resolution of the present appalling crisis, there is no place for the ideologues of free-market economics to stand back and wring their hands in the face of the devastation. From the laundries in Larkhall--I am glad that I was able to bring those to the attention of the right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King)--to the shops in Shetland and the shed builders in my constituency, we see a trail of Government incompetence that can be measured in lost jobs, lost business and lost confidence.
It is no surprise that the people involved in the industry, many of whom would previously have been Conservative supporters, are complaining about the Government's double whammy of lost jobs and lost markets. The long-term implications of the catastrophe will last for years.
Sir John Cope (Northavon):
The hon. Member for Monklands, East (Mrs. Liddell) was unwise to start her speech by saying that she would not adopt a confrontational approach, when presumably she knew perfectly well that she intended to wax lyrical about the Government sitting on their hands, about their incompetence and about all her other accusations. If she knew that she intended to say those things, she should not have started off by saying that she was not going to take a confrontational line. That was a ridiculous way in which to begin.
When the hon. Lady was asked what she would do, she said, of course, that she would set up an inquiry. We have come to recognise that as the standard Opposition response, dictated by the spin doctors to give every impression of offering assistance while avoiding expenditure commitments.
Towards the end of her speech, the hon. Lady talked about the need for co-ordination, and there I entirely agree with her--except that she seems to have ignored the fact that the Minister of State has daily meetings for exactly that purpose with the representatives of all the interests concerned with the beef crisis.
The debate is potentially wide, but it is necessary to talk about the beef crisis first. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Agriculture said, that is a tragedy, because, until 19 March, the whole agriculture industry was doing well. Since then, the terrible tragedy has hit us, and it has been extremely difficult for all concerned. The situation is made more difficult to accept, both for ourselves and for the farmers and others involved, by the fact that European Union relief always seems about to arrive next week rather than this, and that goes on week after week.
We discussed the 30-month slaughter scheme earlier in the week, and again yesterday. The Minister of State briefed some representatives of my local National Farmers Union yesterday during the lobby by the farmers, and I am glad to say that he could show them that he and the rest of the Government are working hard on the problem and doing their best to achieve the co-ordination that the hon. Member for Monklands, East, as well as everybody else, including myself, wishes to see.
It is essential to build up the slaughter scheme for cows older than 30 months as fast as possible, but it must be 100 per cent. secure. The Minister of State is right to emphasise, as he has done both yesterday and on other occasions, the fact that it is vital that the scheme be totally reliable. There are plenty of people in the media who will try to eat away at it and prove that it is not working, and any such publicity would be exceptionally damaging for everyone concerned in every part of the beef chain.
Some Members seem to think that the Treasury, a Department in which I served for a while, may sometimes be holding things up. I therefore take the opportunity of
assuring hon. Members that the Treasury is a shrewd, hard-headed Department, whose inhabitants realise full well that delay in setting up the slaughter scheme and in getting it running effectively would not be in the Treasury's interests any more than it would be in anybody else's interests.
There is a considerable backlog, which we have discussed. The bigger the backlog becomes because of delays in setting up the scheme, the greater the need for emergency measures, which would obviously be expensive for the Treasury. More importantly, delays in the slaughter scheme will delay the recovery of confidence, which is the last thing that we want. The recovery of consumer confidence is at the heart of the matter in the United Kingdom, in the European Community and in the rest of the world. We have been told that confidence is a central motive of the European ban, which was said to have been introduced specifically for market reasons rather than for scientific reasons.
The fact is that continental Governments have, by their actions, damaged their beef markets to a greater degree than our beef market has been damaged. That should not be surprising because when the Government, veterinarians and scientific and medical opinion in a country say that all beef--but British beef in particular--may be unsafe, the effect on confidence is likely to be greater than in a country, such as the UK, in which the Government, veterinarians and medical opinion say the opposite, that beef is safe. That is one of the reasons why confidence in this country has held up better than it has in Germany and in other countries across the continent.
One of the most pernicious aspects of this affair has been the behaviour and treatment of the EC standing veterinary committee. I do not wish directly to impugn the professional integrity of other EC member states' chief veterinary officers, who sit on the committee, but it seems that their decisions have been taken on market grounds rather than on scientific grounds. If that is so, that is quite wrong and exceptionally damaging, as I have explained. Governments have legitimately a responsibility for markets and for market confidence must take action accordingly, but chief veterinary officers should stick to scientific opinion. It would be in our interest if they did so.
The arguments have become rather circular. Governments say, "We must restrict beef sales to protect public confidence," and the public say, "There must be something in all this if the Government are restricting beef sales." So the argument on the continent seems to go round and round.
We are making some progress, for which I pay tribute to my right hon. and hon. Friends in the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and in other parts of the Government. The Commission and some member states now seem to be much more on our side than they were a few weeks ago, and obviously President Chirac's remarks yesterday have helped, as have his actions.
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