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Mr. Lord: Provided that producers can present proof of sale, will any of those payments be retrospective?
Mr. Baldry: We must consider that issue. If we had a retrospective scheme, could we fairly apply it because of the difficulties of proof of sale? I certainly want to help clean beef producers, who have clearly suffered losses. Those producers who have sold since 20 March have tended to sell because they were compelled to do so--either for lack of grass or lack of cash.
The principal market support mechanism in the beef sector is intervention--the only mechanism that we have to support the market in beef from animals under 30 months of age. We have worked hard to make intervention more accessible to and more effective for UK operators. We have persuaded the Commission to widen the coverage for steers from two carcase classes to six and, for the first time, young bulls have been included. As a result, current UK intervention coverage, expressed as a percentage of total annual saleable production, has increased to about 47 per cent. As a consequence of these changes, since the end of March bids for some 17,829 tonnes of UK beef have been accepted. In the most recent tenders, quantities bid for by operators in other member states have been significantly cut by the Commission and the beef management committee but UK bids have been allowed to stand, in recognition of the fact that UK market prices are the lowest in the EU.
Sir Roger Moate (Faversham):
I am glad that my hon. Friend has mentioned the support measures for clean beef. It is critical that the industry does not continue to incur its present heavy losses. As the moneys that my hon. Friend mentioned are specifically allocated to each nation, they are precisely capped. How much of the £680 million will be available to the United Kingdom to support beef prices?
Mr. Baldry:
Under the first part of the scheme, the UK's share of the £527 million is £13.96 million. There is additional money for further national aid. It will be sensible to wait to see what emerges from the Council meeting in terms of the total package to assist UK clean beef producers and any further assistance that we can give them. We must ensure that the intervention system works as effectively as possible.
The system is still not ideally suited to UK operators--not least because it fails to take sufficient account of the costs that slaughterers face in disposing of the so-called fifth quarter. Fifth quarter returns depended crucially on their being a market for meat, bonemeal and red offals. Those markets have effectively been removed, in part by the prohibition on the use of mammalian protein in animal feed in the UK, and in part by the imposition of the EU export ban, which has greatly reduced the demand for offal. As such, slaughterers face additional costs in disposing of unsaleable produce. Those costs are not taken into account in the so-called processor's margin allowed for in the calculation of maximum acceptable bids under
the rules for intervention tenders. We have pressed the Commission hard on that aspect and will continue to press it hard to devise a proposal to increase the margin to reflect more nearly the actual costs faced by the industry. We are determined to do all that we can to help the under-30-month clean beef producer.
Mr. Barry Field (Isle of Wight):
When can farmers expect feed that described its ingredients? That matter is of great concern to my farmers.
Mr. Baldry:
Discussions about feed descriptions are continuing with the industry. Every farmer in the country should know full well that there is no justification or excuse--there has not been for some time--for having feed containing mammalian meat and bonemeal on his farm. An effective recall system is now in operation, and from 1 August it will be a criminal offence to possess such feed.
Dr. Gavin Strang (Edinburgh, East):
BSE has been a problem in the United Kingdom for more than a decade. The first cases of this terrible disease are believed by Government scientists to have emerged by 1985 and the disease was officially identified in 1986.
We are still not sure that CJD can be caused by eating beef or beef products containing the BSE agent, but the possibility has always been recognised. In 1989, the Government's Southwood committee advised that the risk of transmission of BSE to humans appeared remote, but could not be ruled out entirely. On 20 March this year, the Secretary of State for Health reported to the House that the Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee had advised the Government that BSE was "the most likely explanation" for an apparently new form of CJD.
I submit to the House that at least four lessons can be learnt from our BSE experience. First, once a possible public health problem is identified, there must be the political will to tackle it. For many years, the Government clearly did not have the political will to protect the public from the possible risk from BSE. That can be the only explanation for their dreadful record of under-regulation and under-enforcement.
The second lesson is that there must be scientific research to tell us what is happening, to identify the nature of the threat and to design ways of combating it. In the debate which I opened for the Opposition the week before last, we dealt with the question of the Government's proposals, even at this stage, to privatise the research being carried out on BSE. Under the prior options review, as hon. Members will be aware, the Institute of Animal Health, which includes the neuropathogenesis unit, is a candidate for privatisation.
As I also pointed out in the debate, on the very day the Secretary of State announced the issue and the crisis started, the Institute of Animal Health announced a loss
of 60 jobs. In 1982, the institute employed 842 people: it now employs 489 people, more than 40 per cent. of whom are on temporary appointments.
Of course, Ministers were repeatedly saying that expenditure on BSE research had been increased. Of course it has been increased--it has been increased substantially--but it would be hard to avoid that when BSE was only identified in 1986. The crucial point is that the increase in research on BSE, CJD and other related issues has taken place against the background of huge cuts in Government-funded agriculture and food research. If the Government survive until May next year, I have calculated that they will have almost halved the number of scientists funded by the Government in food and agriculture research. They have already cut the numbers by more than 40 per cent.
The third lesson is that there must be regulation to protect the public. The House is aware of the Government's record of delay in regulating to protect human and animal health from BSE. There was a 20-month delay after identifying BSE before farmers had to destroy all suspect BSE cases. There was a delay of two and a half years before the Government said in June 1989 that they planned to ban the most infective offal from human food. Another seven-month delay followed before that was fully implemented throughout the UK and farmers were not fully compensated for slaughtering BSE cattle until February 1990. The Government have admitted that under-compensation for the previous 18 months deterred farmers from declaring suspect cases.
The fourth lesson is that regulations to protect our health must be properly enforced. The House will remember the Government's appalling record on enforcing BSE control regulations. In September 1995, 48 per cent. of slaughterhouses visited were found to be in breach of BSE controls designed to keep infective offal from human food.
Mr. Budgen:
Does the hon. Gentleman recall that, during that time, there were frequent recollections by hon. Members on both sides of the House that the regulations should not be stringently enforced against those abattoirs that were having to come to terms with new European regulations? If they had been stringently enforced, there would have been a frightful row from all the abattoir owners.
Dr. Strang:
I am not sure whether we are on the same wavelength. Is the hon. Gentleman really suggesting that hon. Members were advocating that the slaughterhouses should not implement the regulations or that there should be some laxity in relation to implementing the measures to keep specified bovine material out of human food, given the possible link with CJD? I hardly believe that hon. Members on either side of the House seriously advocated that.
This March, 4 per cent. of slaughterhouses and 17 per cent. of rendering plants visited were still in breach of the controls. In February and March this year, eight feedmills were found to be in breach of the mammalian protein ban to keep BSE out of cattle feed.
Over the years, I have warned the House about the implications of the cuts made in the number of public servants responsible for keeping our food safe. I welcome the fact that the Government have increased the number
of meat inspectors--the Minister referred to that. The inspectors are important. However, as well as the inspectors, I submit that the state veterinary service is in the front line. I have to remind the House that the number of vets employed by the state veterinary service has fallen by about one third since 1979. I hope that the Government will say something positive about how they intend to rebuild that service.
Someone said to me, "Save the state veterinary service." That may be an exaggeration, but it strikes me that Ministers keep referring to additional resources for meat inspectors, which we welcome, but there is never any statement about additional resources for the state veterinary service. I hope that there will be some response on that.
This is not a matter of being wise after the event. The Minister used the word "hindsight". Much as Ministers would like to say so, that is not the case. By May 1989, the Labour party had realised that it was vital to ban cattle offal from human food, to compensate farmers fully for slaughtered BSE cattle and to ban the export of meat and bonemeal for cattle feed. Of course, by then we all accepted the need to prevent ruminant protein from getting into cattle feed. All these things are on the record. We called on the Government to halt the export of meat and bonemeal to other countries. I refer to that because of the publicity that has surrounded the issue in the past couple of weeks.
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