Examination of Witnesses(Questions 40
- 59)
WEDNESDAY 24 FEBRUARY 1999
MR JEFF
ROOKER, MP
and THE RT
HON TESSA
JOWELL, MP
Ms Keeble
40. In terms of improving food safety in
particular, to a certain extent, the success of the FSA will depend
partly on its enforcement powers and its ability to improve standards.
It is well known that there is a lot of difference between local
authorities and the way they approach food safety, the resources
they allocate to it and their competence. How do you expect the
FSA to be able to deal with that?
(Mr Rooker) Both our departments currently deal
with these issues. You are quite right. There are several hundred
enforcement authorities in the country and positions do vary.
Different local authorities give the issue a different degree
of importance in their budgets. Nevertheless, there is a variety
of cooperation that has surprised me in the last two years, particularly
in parts of the Midlands where two or three counties actually
share the environmental expertise that each of them has to make
sure areas are covered that they have not necessarily got themselves.
I think that is very important and I am sure the Agency would
encourage that. One of the key areas is to ensure that each authority
knows where all the registered food premises are in their area.
There will be an incentive for them to do that because they will
get, if you like, a cut of the levy. We know, because of the famous
case published last year, that the authority where we are physically
situated at the moment did not know of 1,700 catering establishments.
I fear for the people eating in those because clearly nobody was
inspecting them. That area has to be looked at. There is a monitoring
role to first of all see what they are doing, not just numbers
of inspections, by the way, because numbers of inspections would
not be the yardstick. I do not think that would be a fair way.
It is the quality of the inspections that take place. Are the
staff properly trained? Is there ongoing training as well as the
hygiene conditions that they personally conduct for themselves,
as well as within the premises? It is not just a question of,
"I have done lots of visits to that place". They may
have only been four or five minutes each without a proper checklist,
without looking at who owns the premises, the part-time workers
who might come in the middle of the night and that kind of thing;
it is the quality of the inspection. It is to audit that kind
of role that I think the Agency will have a key role in and then
it will set enforcement standards by which the authorities will
be monitored. If they fall down on the job, that will be publicly
known and action can be taken.
41. I agree with the point about the quality
of inspections but if you take, for example, the big outbreak
of E-coli in Scotland I understand that the butcher's shop had
actually been inspected by Environmental Health Officers. What
I am concerned about is there is quite likely to be an outbreak
of food-borne illness after the FSA is set up. That is bound to
happen but if it then transpires that the premises were inspected
by Environmental Health Officers and people say, "Why did
not the FSA prevent this?" and the reply then comes back
that it is not actually the FSA's job to do that; it is down to
the Environmental Health Officers, the same as it always was,
is not there going to be a real crisis of public confidence because
they think things are going to be qualitatively different? I suspect
that includes that they think that the inspections and the enforcement
will be different as well.
(Mr Rooker) There will be an improvement I hope
in enforcement inspections because the local authorities will
actually gain some extra resources from the levy. We have not
got a figure at the moment, obviously we are still consulting
on the principle of the levy and the figures but the intention
is that part of what they collect, because they will be the collection
agency, will cover the cost of collection plus an additional amount
they will retain as extra resources over and above that which
they receive. They will not have that lot withdrawn from their
Standard Spending Assessment from the Department of the Environment.
42. They do not have currently have an SSA
for this function? Is there going to be some recognition by the
Department of the Environment of the SSA for this very important
function?
(Mr Rooker) We were at one time under pressure
to ring fence the money. We were under pressure at one time to
remove all this from local authorities, a bit like the Meat Hygiene
Service had been done, if you like. The enforcement processes
in many local authorities are absolutely excellent and first class,
they are a model to the rest of the country. They will be a model
on which the Agency could build for the rest of the country so
it does not make sense for us to destroy what is good. As I say,
we do not want to take our eye off the ball as to why we are setting
up the Agency by destroying and having massive turmoil in the
existing system, that will cause a loss of public confidence.
The intention is, it is true, to raise standards of enforcement
and inspection. That will not happen day one, by definition that
will not happen day one but that is the intention and the Agency
will be proactive—proactive—in dealing with this issue.
The local authorities, from our discussions with them, fully endorse
this and embrace this. Obviously they always talk about resources,
as they always do in every area, and I understand the reason why.
As a Ministry we talk about resources as well when we are having
discussions with our colleagues in the Treasury.
43. I take that point that there is some
good practice. I just wonder if you could say something about
the timescale that you expect the FSA to be able to improve the
standards by? For example, looking at areas like the split between
the Environmental Health Office and Trading Standards which in
some areas means it will have different local authorities responsible
for inspecting different bits of the FSA key functions. Also dealing
with the fact that some EHOs are superb, but with the best will
in the world they also have to deal with Christmas toys and fireworks
and things like that and also when the beef on the bone rules
came out there was less than overwhelming enthusiasm for enforcing
those rules. It might well be the FSA has to contend with some
Environmental Health Officers who are not overwhelmed with the
idea of new duties. What kind of timescale? How much will they
use carrot and how much will they use stick?
(Mr Rooker) I cannot really put a time on that
with respect, Chairman. We are not trying to second guess, as
Ministers at the moment, about how the FSA will work through its
priorities and timetable within the guiding principles and the
new powers that it is going to have. It would not make sense for
us to try and do that, we do not have the legal authority to do
it by the way which is why we need the legislation in this draft
Bill for the Agency to be able to do this. I cannot really put
a timescale on that and it would be quite ridiculous. I suspect
by the time, if you like, when the Bill is going through the House
we might have more of an idea but it is the Agency's function
to do this. We are not trying to second guess it as a Government
now, we know the job needs doing which is why we are giving the
Agency this role and taking, with the approval of the House, the
necessary legislative power to make sure it has got that power.
So far as how it works between Trading Standards Officers and
Environmental Health Officers that would be, I would imagine,
a pretty early matter on its agenda because that will be a test
for the future. Obviously changing policy and practice in this
area is not going to be done overnight, it will be something the
Agency wants to start up. As I have said it is one of the three
new areas of work that does not take place at the present time,
therefore I would imagine it would be fairly high on the priorities
for the Agency.
44. You mentioned that you had been under
some pressure to set up a dedicated team of inspectors, perhaps
along the lines of the Meat Hygiene Service or the Food and Drug
Administration in the States. Could you say a bit more about why
you turned that down and why you opted for this rather than a
contractual model as the Agriculture Select Committee suggested?
You opted for using some enforcement means which we have currently
and frankly we have a fairly patchy record.
(Mr Rooker) At the risk of repeating myself, we
did not see the justification for a Meat Hygiene Service type
operation. We did not see the justification for removing from
elected local government this key enforcement role. These are
the food police at the sharp end. There is a tremendous amount
of expertise and goodwill out there. I agree performance is patchy
which is why we want that issue addressed. We did not see a justification
for making a massive change, which it would be, in terms of the
power structure between central and local government, at the same
time as setting up an Agency to operate at arms' length from Ministers.
Frankly, we would not get the Agency up and running quickly if
we overloaded—and I am not using that as an excuse because
I did not think it would be the right thing to do anyway—the
Agency with lots and lots of new functions and powers over that
which is needed to do the main function. We are trying got keep
to that narrow limit to make it a success so that when it starts
it becomes seamless, no big bang on the first day because of the
culture change of the two Ministries in the Joint Food Standards
and Safety Group, the way we operate now, but to make sure it
actually works which is why we do not want to have lots of add-ons
to it but deal with the areas where we do know attention needs
to be given.
(Tessa Jowell) Could I just add very briefly to
that because I think that Jeff has set out the purpose and the
nature of the relationship between the Agency and local authorities
very clearly indeed. The aim is to drive up standards and to achieve
much greater consistency of standards across local authorities.
I think your question also touches on another major challenge
for the Agency. Your point about if there is another outbreak
will this not simply lead to a collapse of public confidence in
the Agency? One of the very important jobs that the Agency will
have to do is first of all to manage reasonable expectation because
these changes will take place over time but secondly, there is
a multitude of causes that create the kind of outbreak which puts
people's health and well being in jeopardy and at the moment there
is far too little public understanding of the range of factors
that contribute to an outbreak of E.coli or salmonella. It is
a very clear balance between clearly a role for Government and
getting the legislative framework right, proper enforcement and
surveillance at a local level, in relation to local authorities,
but also the health authority has a role and I hope that the much
closer working relationships between health and local authorities
will be a way of reinforcing this link. But so too do we want
a better level of individual public understanding about what people
can do themselves in the privacy of their own homes to minimise
the risk of infection.
Mr Paterson
45. Can I just come in. Will there be an
increase in the number of people inspecting on the ground and
will they be qualified? I have had considerable reports of officials
coming in with no experience of food processing. We hear of vets
employed by the Meat Hygiene Service who have never been to an
abattoir who are supposed to be controlling slaughtering. What
influence will the Food Standards Agency have on the number of
people employed and their qualifications?
(Mr Rooker) When you say employed, I am assuming
therefore you are talking about first of all people employed by
local authorities. They will not necessarily have an influence
on the numbers employed by local authorities. Because of its role
in setting standards for enforcement by local authorities and
then monitoring and altering those and if there is a failure taking
action, quite clearly the Food Agency will have certainly good
and constructive discussions with local authorities to make sure
those standards are enforced. By definition, that is going to
have to take account of the qualifications and quality and training
of enforcement officers, not necessarily numbers. This is a question
of resource allocation in the best area. You mentioned, of course,
the Meat Hygiene Service which is slightly different because the
Meat Hygiene Service exists as an Executive Agency of MAFF. It
will report into the Food Standards Agency. Obviously it employs
vets and other officials. There is a shortage of vets, the way
they train vets in the European Union is somewhat different from
the way we train vets in this country. Certainly you can be a
trained vet without ever having been near a large animal I understand
in some countries in the European Union. This causes—how
can I say—distress in our abattoirs when confronted with
vets who are now registered here because of the system in the
European Union but have not actually seen some of the practices
they are employed to inspect. I understand the distress of quality
people working in the meat industry when this situation arises.
Hopefully it is short term until we can get more people trained
in this country because we have been under-implementing and therefore
under training staff, there is a shortage. We are required to
operate those European Union Directives and because we were found
not to be doing so it puts at risk the lifting of the beef export
ban and that is why we have taken the steps we have within the
Meat Hygiene Service to get more people. We have to recruit from
the European Union. Like you I would want everyone to be better
qualified and at least up to level standards across Europe and
that is a matter we have had ongoing discussions with the Royal
College about since I have been in the Ministry.
46. What you are admitting then is it is
tokenism, we have got vets standing by in abattoirs who are quite
unqualified.
(Mr Rooker) They are not qualified the same as
our vets would be qualified but they are qualified.
47. I take that point but they are not qualified
to control the process of slaughtering and cutting up animals.
They may be qualified in looking after cats or small dogs I quite
agree. Surely it is tokenism, we are following a Directive, we
are imposing a huge cost—£6 million a year on the meat
industry to employ these people—and they bring no added
value or any safety knowledge at all?
(Mr Rooker) I think that is a very stark way of
putting what is the situation you describe. I cannot go beyond
saying I share the distress of some people who work in the abattoirs
that these situations arise. Nevertheless we are required, we
are audited ourselves do not forget, the Meat Hygiene Service
is audited by the State Veterinary Service and subject to spot-checks
by European Union auditors as well. Nobody has said and claimed
that what we are doing in terms of inspection in the abattoirs
and cutting plants is not in conformity with the regulations.
Indeed, because of the extra costs and because of extra enforcement,
we are now enforcing the regulations, albeit with staff who might
not be up to the same training standards as our own but we are
now enforcing to a much greater extent than we were two years
ago. That has got to be good for consumer confidence, even though
there is an extra cost to the industry.
48. This is the absolute nub of the whole
subject, surely. There is a danger that we are going to build
a Potemkin Palace. We will go through the motions of having better
control. We will have this huge new organisation, a huge new budget,
£50 million resources or whatever, but unless we have thoroughly
qualified people on the ground who understand the mechanics of
slaughtering and food production there will be no health gain
whatever. We will fulfil all the requirements of this Act and
we will fulfil the requirements of the EU Directives but there
will be no health gain. It is pointless employing these people
if they do not understand the food processing.
(Mr Rooker) I do not accept it is tokenism. What
we have said—and I have made this clear in letters to colleagues
who have raised this issue with me so it is a matter of public
record—we will concentrate the extra resources, ie. the
extra vets and inspectors, in those areas of the meat industry
where they are needed, i.e. where there is a continual low HAS
score. In other words, it is not the intention to overdo those
who are scoring high anyway, we will concentrate where we need
to with greater more frequent inspections for the low scorers
in order to raise standards. In some areas of the meat industry
we still need to raise standards. We are taking extra powers in
the near future to have extra powers in respect of where there
is fault on hygiene on the physical part of the premises so that
we can close quicker than we can at the moment. We will make sure
these resources, these vets who are not trained in the way that
our vets are but they are trained in conformity with the European
Union regulations are put in the areas where we think standards
need raising. By definition: low scoring cutting plants and abattoirs.
Chairman: Could I
thank you for that Minister and could I move on to Stephen Ladyman.
Dr Ladyman
49. For my sins I am still the vice chairman
of finance on my local district council. I have to tell you that
when the revenue support grant gets increased my mind does not
turn immediately to employing more environmental health officers,
it is not high on the political agenda in the district. How are
you going to force me to put whatever money that you or FSA makes
available through the levy that comes to my district, how are
you going to force me to spend that in these areas you want me
to spend it?
(Mr Rooker) Well, it is not a question of forcing
but if the local authorities with the new resources and the new
standards once they have been set are not found to be delivering
those standards consistently, the Food Standards Agency has got
the powers in this Bill to withdraw from that local authority
the power to carry out that function. It has got the power to
say to another local authority: "Would you like to subcontract
and do the job for this authority down the road that is not up
to the job". That I think is a very powerful sanction for
local government to take the issue seriously. It is not just a
question of us forcing them to spend money, it is a question of
the Foods Standard Agency forcing them to raise standards and
doing it in this way. The ultimate sanction, they will lose that
role. This will be known to their electorate, do not forget. This
will all be published. There will be pressure from below as well
as pressure from above.
50. Say you took that up, I had this money
in this area and you took that view, the FSA took that view that
they wanted to get somebody else to subcontract, there would be
a removal from my Council's budget of some part of its settlement
or the levy that it was receiving in order to pay for that subcontracting.
The Food Standards Agency would effectively be making an estimate,
looking for a benchmark about what is reasonable for a particular
district of a particular size to be spending in this area. Is
there any intention it will do that on a general basis and indicate
to districts for your population you ought to be spending about
this amount of money?
(Mr Rooker) No, I think that is for the Agency
to make this assessment. If you go back to the White Paper, when
we are trying to put together what the existing expenditure in
this country on food standards and safety it is very difficult
to get a global figure. Some of it is spent by central Government,
my Department, Tessa's Department and then of course local government.
The estimate in the White Paper for Local Government I think was
a figure between £150 and 180 million, we did not know. We
did not know simply because of a couple of hundred different policies,
different priorities, people like you, hard nosed finance people
looking at accounts, not thinking of the reality of the service.
Not being personal but you understand what I mean.
51. Yes.
(Mr Rooker) It is the way I judge treasurers and
finance people. It is not a question I think of saying: "This
is what you should spend in terms of money" but "This
is the service you should deliver. These are the standards we
expect for food standards and safety". Obviously over a period
of time, when you have a national Agency doing this—no-one
is doing this at present, there is no authority to do it—it
will build up some benchmarks. It is inevitable that is bound
to be the case, in isolated area, rural areas, depopulated areas,
different from inner city. Inner city have still got some battery
slaughter houses. It is an area we are concentrating on where
it is sold cheap. Why is it sold cheap because they are cutting
corners, maybe, on health and safety. That has to stop. We have
to deal with that. I do not think it is possible for us to say:
"This is what you should spend" but over a period of
time there may be some benchmarks, the test will not be what you
spend, it will be the service you deliver as food standards and
safety for your local population.
Ms Keeble
52. I just want to ask two more questions.
One is about the Food Standards Agency surveillance. In the proposals
it will be able to conduct surveillance work over and above that
which is done for the PSD, VMD and for MAFF. Why does not the
Food Standards Agency simply take responsibility for all of the
surveillance work? Will the people who do this be the same people
who do the monitoring of local authority surveillance work?
(Mr Rooker) It is an interesting question. I accept
that this is where we have not accepted the recommendation of
the Agriculture Select Committee of course but we have in the
light of the Select Committee's report on surveillance programmes
on pesticides and veterinary medicines gone back to square one
in the many months since it was published. I have to say of all
the debates on the Food Standards Agency since I have been in
MAFF, since day one, we have had bigger debates about veterinary
medicines and pesticides in or out of the Agency than we ever
did on nutrition. Nutrition was always the headline issue, the
one the big row was about. We did not have rows, the nutrition
thing was settled amicably in the White Paper and we have kept
to that. We had bigger divisions about, as Phillip James said,
do we take the directorates and the agencies into the Agency and
we said no. Then it became from the Select Committee's point of
view "What about the surveillance programme". Well,
we have had a look at this and we have tried to say what is the
role of the surveillance programme. Veterinary medicines, there
are something like I think about 40,000 samples a year of different
tests on different meats, we have a programme. It is all contracted
out, by the way, it is contracted out, different laboratories,
different purchasing arrangements to check the products around
the country. That is done independently in the laboratories. The
results we are going to publish by brand name of the veterinary
medicines and the pesticides as well. The Pesticide Directorate
similarly, we have a Pesticide Residues Working Party which oversees
this and does an annual report, they will become the Pesticides
Residues Committee. There is another advisory group on veterinary
medicines which will become the Veterinary Residues Committee
and that will have an independent chairman. At the moment it is
chaired by the director of the Veterinary Medicines Directorate
so there will be an independent chairman on that. We are making
changes. The surveillance programmes they conduct will be in conjunction
with maybe FSA requirements. What we do not want to do is have
the FSA trying to mirror image and become a micro mini-MAFF in
the early days. That is not to say this is closed off for all
time. We have had a big debate about how we should do this now
for the start up. We have extensive pesticide residue programmes
in all kinds of products by the way and we prosecute people as
well, you know in areas where they are over and above. We find
one per cent above the levels only. We find residues in about
30 per cent, 70 per cent of what we check no residues whatsoever.
It is very extensive, it runs to tens of thousands of samples
of produce for pesticide residues. That will continue. Of course,
they will be talking to the Agency, the Agency as I said in terms
of pesticide regulation and approval will have a veto on pesticides
as they come through the system.
53. The final question is I think you have
set out very clearly what the proposals are for dealing with food
premises which come under the normal local authority remit. It
is the extension beyond there. I saw after the presentation we
had previously that indeed the powers do go on to the farm but
they are only for observation. I wonder whether they will be for
entering the premises and seizing samples. I have visions of the
person from the FSA marching on to the farm and trying to seize
some samples, I do not know whether that is how it will happen?
Secondly, whether they will be able to trace that past the import?
One of the examples we had on a visit to the States was when some
strawberries were traced back to Guatemala and it was found that
the farmers had soiled boots, they had boots with manure on and
the result was that over a thousand school kids got poisoned.
Will they also trace back to see what happens abroad? There are
huge fears about imported foods.
(Mr Rooker) I think that particular contamination
was something rather different from farm boots but I will not
go into the details of how those strawberries got contaminated.
54. It is obviously the same story.
(Mr Rooker) Some probably angry low paid aggrieved
workers probably get their own back on American children. The
point you raised, there will be no no-go areas in the food chain
for the Food Standards Agency, let us make that clear.
55. They can do anything? They can take
samples as well?
(Mr Rooker) There will be no no-go areas in the
food chain. I use the term food chain, I was reading an essay
a couple of weeks ago, the food chain is a very simplistic way
of describing it. It was described in what I was reading as almost
like a tangled plate of spaghetti because of the way foods are
processed today and trying to untangle bits of it. It is not a
chain in a single line looking at it. The job of looking at food
as a whole is much more difficult than what might be the simplistic
way of describing it as a chain. The fact is there will not be
any areas where the Food Agency cannot go but it will go to a
greater or lesser extent as to where it perceives the problems
are. Now if it perceives there are problems on the farm, either
in husbandry practices, the way food is collected, the way it
is cropped, the way it is stored in the grain stores, and draws
that to the attention of the existing regulatory authorities for
that and then does not get any action, and does not get satisfaction
then the powers in this Bill give the Food Standards Agency the
power to make sure that things happen. It can make things happen.
Initially it would only go for information. I have to say the
powers in the one clause—I think it is 13—can read
as quite onerous, they are not intended to be. The Food Standards
Agency police over the farm gate, into the farm every day of the
year, that is not the intention. We would be failing though if
in bringing this legislation forward, and saying that there is
no part of the food chain where the Agency cannot go, if we do
not provide the primary legislation to make sure if a problem
is perceived it can be dealt with. Now that has been in place
for the whole of the food industry. Obviously we are consulting
at the moment but that was always our intention, it was what was
set out in the White Paper. The National Farmers Union is 100
per cent behind the Food Standards Agency because they see the
big increase in consumer confidence. Also they see us dealing
with imported foods. It is very important the Agency, although
we do not discriminate against home production because of the
way we collect the levy at the retail end, it will have an interest
I am sure in the food chain, even for imported foods, as we have
to do now within the European Union. Some foods are coming to
this country, they are on the shelves, they are consumed within
a couple of days. We import horticultural produce from 60 different
countries. Now that kind of information has got to be of interest
to anyone concerned with food standards and safety. Where was
it grown? Were the workers well paid so they did not try and contaminate
the food as it left? What pesticides were used? How is it transported?
How is it stored? Now I know now our big supermarkets ask those
kind of questions and have got their own traceability through
the food chain, that does not always happen of course with the
smaller areas. The Food Agency will have a role throughout the
whole of the food chain to ensure that the gaps are filled and
information is available.
56. How would you deal, for example, with
EU and world trade organisations if you start putting pressure
on overseas producers to improve their standards? I do think food
standards in this country are very superior often, certainly to
what we saw in the States on the Select Committee visit and large
part of Europe as well.
(Mr Rooker) I would say with great difficulty
if they go for a lesser degree of standards than we do. Our intention
is obviously to work within the European Union. Most of our food
policies are agreed within the European Union and then we are
subject, of course, to the world trading organisation. We are
talking here about the roles of individual——Nobody
has a policy, by the way, for providing unsafe food in the world
trade organisations, to the best of my knowledge.
57. They still manage to do it.
(Mr Rooker) Well they might be managing to do
it but therefore we have to block that off. Now I do not see anybody
arguing against that. We are setting up a process in this country,
others are looking at what we are doing by the way, we are not
inventing the wheel but we are trying a new way of conducting
food policy in respect of food standards. I realise food policy
is a much wider issue than food standards and safety, it goes
beyond that. What we are seeking to do is to set up a new organisation
that has the benefits that we have touched on this morning throughout
the food chain. Where problems are highlighted, whether it is
labelling, surveillance, use of pesticides in some countries that
we do not allow in this country, it may be that they have to allow
them in a third world or different countries because the nature
of the pests is different, we have to take account of that. We
are in a global market, we cannot abrogate and erect false import
barriers, that would not be the intention. The Food Standards
Agency is not going down that road. It will have a role and other
organisations want to have a role throughout the whole of the
food chain and where we see problems to get these discussed and
agreed at international level. I realise we cannot always get
our own way by the way in the United Kingdom, even in the European
Union and I think that is a good example. Here is a good example,
yes I almost had a fatwa put on me for pistachio nuts a year ago.
We had an order prohibiting the importation into Britain of pistachios
which originated or were consigned from Iran. The ban followed
high frequencies of contamination, high levels of aflatoxin found
in pistachios imported from Iran. We did that in September 1997.
That encouraged the Iranians to do a lot of work in their own
country. In other words, that was done on that basis because once
we had done that they had got a problem within the European Union.
As I say, no-one has got an intent—whatever we may think—to
supply into this country foods which are going to cause people
damage. The system does need policing, I accept that. The Food
Agency can have a role in that with other authorities, it will
not be doing that all on its own.
Dr Moonie
58. You have mentioned the veto twice, will
they have the power and the resources to commission their own
research?
(Mr Rooker) Yes. They will take over MAFF's research
budget. Our total Departmental budget is about £130 million.
What we have identified so far—there is other work going
on on this because it is a moving target in the sense of being
an annual figure—that between MAFF and the Department of
Health the budget that relates to food standard safety is around
about £25 million, the figure we have put in the White Paper,
that is give or take a modest amount. That budget will be transferred
over, as indeed will all the projects that are currently under
way on vesting day. At any one time in my Department we have got
2,000 projects we are funding across MAFF. We receive something
like 800 research papers a year, that is roughly three a day,
in terms of all of our policy, that includes animal health, fishing
and food. Our policy is based upon the research, the research
is led by the policy people. We do not have a research programme
per se. The research projects are all designed to effect
the policy. The Food Agency, I presume they will operate on the
same basis, they will have the money transferred over to them
certainly.
Dr Brand
59. Brilliant illustration of the Minister's
grasp of the incredibly complex current situation on food safety.
I have just been counting up: we have the world trade organisations,
European Union, United Kingdom, other countries of the United
Kingdom, counties and districts, all with a mixture of statutory
powers and advisory duties. The new Bill suggests we will have
concordats in addition to that. Are you happy that the framework
you have created will actually allow something to evolve which
clearly needs to make the world a bit more easily accountable
place? At the moment I think certainly the consumer is very confused
as to who is responsible for what activity.
(Mr Rooker) I would imagine once the Agency is
up and running, the interface with the public between this Agency
and other agencies of Government I think will be quite high. We
will have to look for some quality people, a chief executive and
chair for this Agency. There will be a big interface I think with
the public. It is all about really eating safely in what is a
dirty world, that is what it is about. I think at different parts
of the chain one needs to have, if you like, more precision, more
regulation than in other parts of the chain. The job of the Agency
is to make sure there are no bits that we do not know about.
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