Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20-32)
Monday 12 May 2003
MR PETER
JINMAN AND
MR CARL
PADGETT
Q20 Chairman: You were talking about
the fact that you had been in discussion with vets from other
countries. Are there examples of where a statutory inspection
scheme works in countries of high animal welfare and low disease?
Mr Jinman: I would have to have
notice of that question.
Chairman: Would you like to have that
as my notice and perhaps send us a note?
Q21 Mr Wiggin: Do you think there
are sufficient vets to undertake any enforcement activities such
as potential farm level good hygienic practice audits?
Mr Jinman: I think there are sufficient.
We have been in a period of time when there were not. The Royal
College will talk to you about numbers but there is evidence to
suggest that we are going to have an output from the colleges
which is going to be higher than it has ever been. We also have
numbers of vets coming in from Australia and New Zealand. 15%
of vets of New Zealand output at any one time are overseas and
a high number are here. We also have European colleges with the
equivalence of qualification and ability to move across. I would
ask you to refer that question to the Royal College for specifics.
The Committee suspended from 5.30pm to 5.41pm
for a division in the House
Q22 Mr Wiggin: One of the things
that occurred to me as I was walking to the division was that
we were talking about how many vets there were. It struck me that
there are an awful lot of very qualified people—I think
it takes at least six years to qualify as a vet—doing things
that you were talking about earlier, examining sheep at Hereford
Market, which I know very well. Do you think this is the right
way to use the rather precious asset that vets represent?
Mr Jinman: I think you are right
to question that and we would also look at what we are doing.
One of the questions earlier on was saying: where are we going
to move to. The point we made on the foot and mouth disease was
there was a feeling that in some of the areas we were asked to
work it was really a misuse of expertise. Surveillance is the
key point here with regard to markets. There is no question that
the right set of eyes are those of a veterinary surgeon. It is
the best opportunity to look at a group of animals at one time
in one place. It is probably the best place you can have. It is
a bit like primary school. In other words, one sneezes and everybody
gets it in the class. It is much the same in the sense that if
you are bringing animals in from all sorts of places and putting
them together we do not even have to look at the diseases that
we regard as being notifiable but the ordinary diseases. Also
welfare. It is a great point for communication, for talking about
problems with farmers, not necessarily taking them to court. It
is more a case of education. Going back to your numbers game,
there are plenty of vets available. How we use them is going to
be partly in the market place. In other words, if there is financial
return, it is private industry; it has to have a financial return.
It is going to work in that area and undoubtedly, when you look
at the bill for foot and mouth disease or for BSE, one is bound
to say that it might be better to pay a little money into the
insurance premium for having a vet in some of these places and
the public purse would be better protected on that basis.
Q23 Mr Wiggin: How should the government
move towards herd health planning rather than what happens at
the moment which is you expect to get a phone call from someone
with an animal that is unwell, which is the fire brigade type
response you mentioned?
Mr Jinman: The good farmer is
already doing that. During foot and mouth, one of the revelations
for all of us, particularly for government, was the number of
farmers, where they were and where the animals were. It came as
a complete surprise: the vast number of sheep in different places
and many of them we visited as vets had never seen a vet at all.
They carried on farming in their own particular way but there
was not a requirement for anybody to come and help or improve
them because they were making a return which they considered was
reasonable or whatever, or they felt they could not do anything
about it. This was a key area of change, of note, that we had
to move on to. On dairy herd health, the schemes that my colleagues
have been involved in generating are extremely good and are already
showing benefits. The problem lies in the marginal areas where
farming has huge problems in terms of return. As we move away
from subsidy to support, we are going to have to question how
we achieve that. My suggestion in the paper we have written to
you is to look at this modulation question and see where there
can be cross-compliance. I appreciate it may be only a once a
year visit. That is a valid argument but we think it is better
once a year than not at all.
Mr Padgett: On the herd health
side, it is a developing philosophy and the crux of it is a strategic
look at how one can plan the health of herds on an individual
basis from a practising vet's point of view and also on a local
basis, again from the practising vet's point of view. You can
get a degree of local veterinary surveillance to see what is going
on in your area, to see what you need to plan against, etc. There
is also a national aspect. Any information that is gathered by
strategically looking at the diseases that are going on on a farm
and the conditions on a farm has the opportunity to release information
for a national type structure. The proper, strategic risk based
management of health on the farm is the way we are trying to look
forward, instead of the fire brigade service. Arguably, it is
already broken by that stage. Let us try and prevent it being
broken.
Q24 Mr Wiggin: When we looked into
bovine tuberculosis under David's chairmanship, one of the problems
was that one of the government solutions was an increase in biosecurity
performed by the farmer which, quite honestly, is going to be
different according to the set-up in each individual case. It
was difficult for farmers to buy cattle that had not already been
tested. One of the problems was that it was very difficult to
get a test because vets were so busy. This shortage that I touched
one earlier was illuminated by that. Who pays? That is what we
come back to. Everything you have said about herd health makes
perfect sense but there is a bill for that and, at the moment,
that is going to be picked up by the public purse. What you were
saying earlier on I am sure is right. Perhaps we should invest
rather than end up with a hefty bill when it all goes wrong. Is
that fair?
Mr Jinman: Yes, I think that is
fair. This is where we do have to look at what is the cost to
the industry and the benefit to the industry. It is quite right
that the farmer pays in that particular regard but when the bill
is going to be picked up by the public I think it is fair and
reasonable that the public should look at it. I would also suggest
that if the public are funding a fair amount of the support into
farming, equally, it is not unreasonable for that payment to be
demanded in that way through the system and there is a quid
pro quo on that.
Q25 Mr Drew: Whatever one's view
of the SVS, the numbers of vets within the service seem to remain
reasonably static. I thought I had the message that on the back
of not just foot and mouth but BSE and swine fever disease there
was a need to increase the number of vets in the SVS; yet, that
does not seem to be happening. Can you map out for me the relationship
of people in private practice, working with the SVS? I will give
two riders. One, there does not seem to be a very high appreciation
of the skills across the board in terms of the SVS and that is
a perception problem. Secondly, in terms of a crisis, you talked
earlier about the management problems of how LVIs are managed.
I wonder if those strains would get worse over time, given what
we have been through, rather than better.
Mr Jinman: I think it is quite
a difficult one to look at. At the present time, the practitioner
in his role as a local veterinary inspector is working as an extension
of the state service. That is the system here. The number of full
time officers is far lower than it would be in France or Spain
where there is a full time system of employment. Numbers vary.
At the present time, they are slightly higher, I think I saw the
other day in a parliamentary answer, than they were a few years
ago, but many of those are short term contracts. My understanding
is they will come to an end in the summer with a probability at
least that they may not continue. The numbers probably will come
down again rather than go up. There is going to be a reliance
upon the practitioner. We have set out for some time the feeling
that we must have a partnership. It is a partnership between the
state, the private practitioner and indeed the farming community
when we are dealing with farming based problems. We are also very
conscious that the next disease problem might not be in the farming
sector. For example, the West Nile virus is one of the possibilities
and that is in the equine sector. We have to ensure that DEFRA,
in whatever form, has, uses and knows how to use the expertise
that is already in existence outside its own boundaries. This
does mean partnership meaning exactly that we are involved in
the process of understanding how they work with us. That needs
your public funding. I do not think there is any question of that.
Equally, one is conscious that in this country we have six million
cats, five million dogs, I have forgotten how many rabbits and
so on. In other words, the pet animal sector is a close binding
of the human being with the pet. We now have schemes by which
pets go abroad and we are already seeing some interesting diseases
in this country which we have never seen before. Those are being
recorded in the laboratories and by the practitioners. This is
reality and we know that the problem is there. Again, it demands
that the practising vet works in harmony with the state. We want
to foster that and we are trying to build that relationship. We
would see that public funds will have to go into that, but we
are prepared on the back of that to be audited, educated and work
with it as is required in that particular sector. One of the interesting
things about foot and mouth disease was that recruitment into
the veterinary service went up because more people found out what
happened within the state service, because it was a little more
opened up, and it appealed to them as a career.
Q26 Mr Drew: It is a bit like wars,
unfortunately. You could be recruited for the Armed Services.
Mr Jinman: Exactly. It may be
equally as ephemeral or whatever.
Q27 Mr Drew: One final question is
the issue of I suppose how you would build, or rebuild, confidence
in the SVS given that when I talk to representatives from the
SVS they are willing to admit that there is this tension between
themselves and private practice. If you had to do three things
to help the future wellbeing of the State Veterinary Service from
a consultancy point of view—we are asking for free consultancy
here—what would they be?
Mr Jinman: I think openness is
the first thing that comes to mind. In other words, we want to
see systems whereby we can be involved in the process. It is a
highly hierarchical business and we saw that during the outbreak;
considerable knowledge was in the ground and was not being used
to the level it should have been because there was no confidence
in the end product. Therefore there were two groups: one in the
mainstream thinking they knew best and those on the ground who
also thought they knew best, and that is never a good recipe for
fighting any war. It requires, therefore, for us in peacetime
to make sure we put the structure together. I am not sure I would
say there is a particular tension between the State Veterinary
Service and practitioners. We work together a lot of the time
but it does require two-way communication and that is building
slowly. It also requires a fundamental understanding that we are
in business in practice and, as such, finance has to be at the
right level if it is going to work. We are perfectly prepared
and very happy to do it but we are at the end of the day having
to earn a living, so figures that are sometimes quoted are unrealistic
as to the likelihood of getting vets involved. I would suggest
again one of the consequences of Competition Commission may well
be that we are going to see fee structure rise anyway and therefore
it is something which may have an effect—we just do not
know at the present time, but certainly think it is very likely
that may happen—and that may equally have some effect on
how we build that up in the future. We do seem to have a slight
difference between different departments governing how they see
the role of the vet and how they see the way forward, and there
is a certain tension there which is not easy for us to assist
in.
Mr Padgett: The three things that
I would pick are increasing communication, backwards and forwards;
increased inclusion of private practice in which the decision-making
is going on, not so private practice decides or demands what is
there but so it can sometimes understand why certain decisions
are being made. Those would be two of my three.
Q28 Chairman: Do you think our State
Veterinary Service is a good one? How many marks out of 10 would
you give it?
Mr Jinman: Judging it against
what criteria?
Q29 Chairman: Well, it has a certain
number of statutory duties which it has to perform; it also has
to relate to you in private practice; it has to manage the LVI
network—is it any good?
Mr Jinman: The answer would be
like the headmaster's report, "Could do better", and
I think therein lies the key: as in the headmaster's report one
always knew that meant that probably there was a fair amount of
areas in which improvement would be looked for.
Q30 Chairman: Where would those be?
Mr Jinman: I think the predominant
one would be the communication one, the inclusiveness. You cannot
have a "them and us" with disease. It is like the nonsense
in my particular county of dealing with foot and mouth disease.
I am on the border with Wales and one minute I am trying to deal
with the Welsh Assembly and a Welsh body with regard to it and
the next I am trying to deal with an English body that is dealing
with London. The disease does not notice the boundary; the disease
has no idea; the farmers have no difficulty because they have
holdings and fields on both sides. The reality is you have to
have a centre of policy for a country and a group that will work
across all boundaries and work together. Co-operation, communication,
then we can work forward and do a good job.
Q31 Chairman: Is the SVS big enough
for the task it now has to do?
Mr Jinman: I think with the present
challenges that it has it is questionable whether it is. It is
having great difficulties coping but I would be more concerned
that perhaps within the SVS—and I am being cautious here
of separating out vets within it from others who are involved—one
of the biggest complaints is that when papers and laws are written
they do not have a sufficient practical input. I know some years
ago, admittedly when I was talking to somebody with regard to
market legislation, and I asked the person if he had ever been
in the market when he had written the legislation the answer came
back "No". It seems to me that we have to ensure that
the people writing the paperwork have had some practical experience
as much as we should have of the difficulties they have in writing
that paperwork,, that is cross-fertilisation as much as anything
else in each of our areas of expertise.
Q32 Chairman: Finally, you mentioned
again your international contacts. Is there a State Veterinary
Service outside the United Kingdom which has particularly impressed
you?
Mr Jinman: I am impressed at the
moment not so much by the particular state service but by the
degree of consultation and usage and co-operation that seems to
be developed. The plans that the Australians are putting together
seems to me to have been a very sensible way forward. I am also
impressed by the immense amount of time and effort the Americans
have put into the Home Lands Security Bill. The veterinary profession
is highly sought after in terms of its views and input into that.
There is no consideration of this boundary between human medicine
and veterinary medicine because when disease strikes who knows
which it is going to harm? Look at the SARS virus at the present
time; look at the influenza question in Hong Kong. We are dealing
with pigs one minute, chickens the next, and humans the next.
Who would have thought that BSE would have been involved in variant
CJD? The barrier between human medicine and veterinary medicine
must be broken down in the minds of all concerned, whether it
be in government or outside. Disease is disease, in whatever form.
Chairman: Gentlemen, thank you very much for
getting our inquiry under way. You cannot withdraw anything you
have said but you can add by means of further submission, and
I think you very kindly indicated there was more you wanted to
say. Please do not feel restricted; the Committee would be very
happy to receive any further papers or thoughts from you. Thank
you very much indeed.
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