Archive Article: 2001/05/18
Controls on imports are just a joke
I read from your continued and excellent coverage (News, May 4) that the appalling illegal importation of meat and animal products continues unabated at an alarming level. It is vital that the government takes swift and decisive action to kill this activity before we have yet another catastrophe in Britain. A catastrophe which might result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people rather than the horrific slaughter of animals that we have seen with foot-and-mouth.
The levels of inspection at all points of entry into these islands must be increased several fold to ensure that no illegal package goes undetected. The cost would be minuscule in comparison to the huge costs of dealing with the F&M fiasco. Anyone caught illegally importing meat or animal products should be photographed with the material and then the material should be confiscated. The offender should be sent back from whence they came with their passport clearly stamped to prevent entry to this country in the future.
We are dealing with a very serious issue and the penalties must be stringent enough to prevent anyone from even contemplating trying to slip something in. Our controls are considered a joke by the rest of the world and there is no time for pussy-footing around to put the necessary control measures in place before we have another disaster. This government must not be allowed to fail us again.
Richard Brookes
The Poplars, The Street, Hepworth, Diss, Norfolk.
Tourism Blairs real concern
I agree with your correspondents (Letters, May 4) regarding the foot-and-mouth disaster and its handling by this government. It became apparent shortly after the outbreak started that Tony Blair and this government were not treating it seriously. It was only when the extent of damage to the tourist industry emerged that they took action. Lessons learned in 1967 were ignored, typical of the arrogance shown by Tony Blair and company.
At the time, I wrote to Mr Blair, Charles Kennedy and William Hague expressing my concerns at the mishandling of the affair. Mr Blair replied that my letter had been forwarded to MAFF; so much for him being in charge. Charles Kennedy replied with much waffle and William Hague has yet to reply.
In desperation, I gathered various cuttings. Those included the mystery of the missing test tube of F&M from Porton Down and that MAFF had plans to kill the national flock to prove we were disease free.
There was also a cutting that quoted an EU meeting in 1998 where plans were unveiled to eliminate all UK livestock farming. I sent the cuttings, together with a letter stating my concerns, to Prince Charles and Tim Yeo.
If these reports are correct, they should galvanise into action any true Brit to defend our traditional way of life. Without farmers during the last war we would have been starved into submission. If we lose our livestock farmers we will be dependent on imports of poor quality meat and milk from Europe, Africa and South America – where F&M still exists.
Tony Blair is succeeding where Hitler could not. He is handing this country over to Europe after stripping it of all its traditions.
Ruby Davison
10 Eden Road, Romanby, Northallerton, North Yorks.
F&M far from under control
Living in Dumfries and Galloway, on the front line of the foot-and-mouth epidemic helps us to focus on the challenges and fears of our predicament. Some of my near neighbours have had their sheep destroyed as part of the 3km cull.
It is fine for others to suggest that the outbreak is under control, or that vaccination is impractical. But the reality is far from what some would have us believe. The virus is not under full control, nor do they know the extent of its spread.
Farms that have been tested negative on more than one occasion are now proving positive, highlighting the inefficiency of such tests. Sheep which are healthy, or perceived to be so, are being slaughtered rightly or wrongly through a policy with as much scientific credence as a wristwatch being mended with sledgehammer.
Why is there such reluctance to graze cattle with sheep? It has been proven that cattle are very susceptible to this particular strain, showing conclusive signs within 24 to 48 hours? There is no shortage of old cast cows, with 70,000 plus stock piled on farms ready for the over 30-month scheme. Grazing them together would help us to identify, with more accuracy and speed, the extent of spread. It would also mean that we were in a stronger position to evaluate the requirements of ring fence fire break vaccination or further expansion of the cull.
It would even remove the risk of flockmasters who never graze sheep with cattle, being exposed before they are allowed to develop immunity, though potential carriers will emerge later should we return to auctioning of breeding sheep.
If we become part of a 3km contiguous cull, officials will need conclusive proof as to why they need to remove only my sheep. Like so many others that have already gone, compensation is not what we want, please just let us farm.
Andrew Stuart Wood
Braco Farm, Auldgirth, Dumfries.
Euroland gang behind it all
Most infectious diseases progress to the epidemic stage by a series of environmental factors producing the right conditions for the initial infection to occur followed by multiplication and dispersal. That certainly happened in the current foot-and-mouth outbreak where initial infection was followed by multiplication in a low standard pig-rearing unit. Then came the needless transport of the pigs across the country to be slaughtered.
When the disease was identified, we had rapid slaughter without rapid disposal of infected carcasses thereby generating additional disease dispersal points. Errors and incompetence abound but the evidence points to a deliberate introduction of F&M. Examination of available evidence points to the evil hand of Euroland. British agriculture has to be removed to make room for the EU applicants with substantial agricultural interests. The initial infection arrived when the Ministry had just learnt how to pronounce spongiform encephalopathy; so the epidemiology of the F&M virus is a total mystery. A politician is the most likely culprit, one who stands to gain most from Britains surrender to the fatal blow of a Brussels directive.
The Downing Street spinners will find it difficult to show leadership qualifications of anything better than lemmings.
M Everest-Todd
Consultant in life science, Ings Farm, North Kelsey, Lincs.
Leaders of the disease league
The Prime Minister claims that foot-and-mouth is under control. England and Scotland failed to win Euro 2000 but we have won F&M 2001. The scores are France 3, Ireland 4, Holland 16, and England and Scotland more than 1600. If the PM is claiming credit for bringing F&M under control, will he also take credit for letting it get out of control?
Alex Mason
Manor Farm, Ablington, Bibury, Cirencester, Glos.
Gill has much to answer for
As a dairy farmer in the 1980s, I had an outbreak of brucellosis in my herd. On veterinary advice, all my cattle were vaccinated to prevent the condition spreading to other cattle in the herd. As I remember there was absolutely no requirement that the milk be withheld from supply.
But the NFUs Ben Gill has made an issue of the fact that the milk and meat from foot-and-mouth vaccinated animals could not be used for human consumption. If vaccination to protect healthy livestock had been started more than a month ago, there would not have been these barbaric and medieval scenes of slaughter across the country.
Mr Gill has much to answer for. He is the one who has had his foot in the door of 10 Downing Street and has had the ear of the Prime Minister. He is the one who should be made to stand by a burning pyre and breathe in the stench of death, until he realises that he was wrong and there was a far more humane way to deal with the disease. He does not even represent all the farmers in the country, as he seems to think.
The scientists and the professors who think that they know how to deal with the outbreak, monitoring it with computer modules and graphs, talked of it being common sense to continue with the contiguous cull. They would not know what common sense is even if it hit them. The local vets should have been given the control of the slaughter or vaccination on an individual farm basis. Then there would not have been the great loss of valuable bloodlines and rare breeds.
John R Ford
8 Mount View Rd, Olivers Battery, Winchester, Hampshire.
NFU shares in dubious areas
I am writing this letter while full of anger having just read about the NFUs £30m investment portfolio (News, May 4).
It is supposed to be a union that should be working its hardest to get better results for British farmers, by putting across our troubles to the powers that be. But we hear that it has shares in Tesco which didnt hold back the fact that it made £1bn in annual profits when foot-and-mouth was at its peak.
There are also shares in Barclays Bank which shut 200 rural branches last year and, most ironic of all, shares in five bio-science companies which produce GM products.
Surely farmers can see where their membership money is going. Lets hope those who havent opened their eyes will wake up and work it out. I am a supporter of Farmers For Action; it seems to be the only organisation, which is on the farmers side. With supposed friends like the NFU, who needs enemies?
* Maxwell
Dairy herd manager, H&V Maxwell and sons, 4 John Mann Gardens, Carnwath, Lanarkshire.
Composting of carcasses
Composting large quantities of carcasses is often used after catastrophic mortality on US farms. I have seen no mention of its use in the latest UK outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. Why is that?
I think that static, wind-row composting would be advantageous. The poultry industry has used this method to manage the mortality due to avian influenza in Pennsylvania and has composted hundreds of thousands of birds in their own growing house.
It is an aerobic process and is amazingly complete within one month during any season when properly managed. More information on this subject is available via Penn State at the web-site:
http://server.age.psu.edu/dept/extension/Factsheets/c/SWMindex.html
William Mulliken
Poultry consultant wem3rd@acadia.net
Porton Down test tube?
I was surprised to read about the test tube with foot-and-mouth that went missing from Porton Down. Is this a hoax or reality?
If it is reality, why have we not heard anything about this on television and radio? They seem to have in depth intrusive reviews about everything else. If a test tube has gone missing why were we not alerted immediately? Perhaps it is because this only effects the farming community. But what if it had been a test tube of anthrax or rabies which could effect the whole of the country?
Why should the government continue to blame the farmers and MAFF when obviously it can cover up negative issues such as security at Porton Down so easily?
* Bradshaw
TW & * Bradshaw & son, Manor Lodge, Kirton-in-Lindsey, Gainsborough, Lincs.
Government condoned crisis
In response to your letter (May 4) regarding the theft of a phial of foot-and-mouth from Porton Down, I would add our view to the requests for details of the truth. There has been no disclaimer of the facts reported in The Sunday Express and it is known that the government was informed in January at the latest of this theft.
Despite that knowledge when the first admitted outbreak occurred on the Wednesday in pigs, movements were not stopped for several days. Livestock markets were told, after contacting MAFF for advice, that it was all right to continue holding their regular markets.
It all makes sense: Requests for timber and coal to burn in the event of a F&M outbreak weeks before February and F&M warning signs ordered from the printers weeks before the outbreak.
It is also more than possible that since this virus came out of a test tube there is no vaccination available for it – hence the prevarication. That would also account for all testing to be done at Pirbright. Under normal F&M conditions all local laboratories would be called in to assist.
Paranoia is now widespread among the farming community. To many people it is becoming increasingly clear that this epidemic was started deliberately and this government has condoned it. Perhaps its a way of bringing forward the EUs decision, taken in 1998, that Britain should not be a livestock producing country but used merely for growing grain and recreation.
It certainly stopped the Countryside March and has put many farmers out of business in accordance with their desire to remove 25,000 small farmers from the industry.
Pat & Tony Rickett
Wood Farm, Everdon, Daventry, Northants.
Vaccination is obvious choice
As a physician and consultant paediatrician, well acquainted with immunisation, I am mystified by the reluctance to vaccinate vulnerable animals against foot-and-mouth in favour of their wholesale slaughter for two major reasons. First, the methods being used for slaughter are themselves creating potential for several serious public health problems both in the immediate future and long term.
These problems could result from contamination of air, earth and water by the dead and rotting animals. There is also the free flow of the virus via birds feeding on the carrion and its release from the heat of the pyres.
Second, the history of immunisation informs us that it has proven to be the single most successful tool in the fight against infectious diseases in humans and animals. One has only to consider the eradication of smallpox and poliomyelitis in their wild, naturally occurring form as well as the prevention of other infectious diseases, to realise the power of immunisation. Therefore, it must be asked what is at the centre of the reluctance to use a vaccine which is already available, to control this and future epidemics of F&M?
It appears that money and commerce are taking centre stage, which is understandable, and laudable, providing it rests within a logical and scientific frame. Immunisation of itself is not prohibitively costly and if compared with the cost in human and animal suffering resulting from slaughter, it is decidedly cheap.
Furthermore, fear that the vaccine and its antibodies would render the meat unsaleable and unfit for human consumption is not founded on current and up-to-date scientific data about vaccines and their mode of operation.
Immunising the animals would prevent transmission of the virus, in its wild or mutated state to humans.
Overall, it appears there is a need to reframe the approach to the management of this disease; one based on the science that will lead to its prevention and ultimate eradication.
Prof Ursula Anderson
10 Cavendish Court, St Georges Road, Brighton, Sussex.
What electronic incompetence…
I cannot believe MAFFs incompetence. For some time now I have been trying to submit my IACS forms electronically. I cannot take them in person to my regional service centre as it is closed due to the foot-and-mouth crisis.
Recent correspondence from MAFF has encouraged farmers to obtain a digital certificate from Equifax and to avoid going to their local chamber of commerce, again due to F&M, to obtain one.
I have done that and used the Equifax certificate to register on the local government website. Several days later the government posted a letter containing a PIN number which I have used to activate my electronic submission. After going on to the MAFF website (iacs2.maff.gov.uk) to retrieve my field data printouts, the certificate was not accepted. A long wait in the queue for the ministry helpline and a subsequent return phone call informed me that the electronic IACS submission was not possible with Equifax certificates at present and no one could tell me when it would be available. It is too late to obtain a Chamberlain certificate and to go through the whole registration process again.
So I will fill my forms out manually and then post them recorded delivery. MAFF wants most IACS forms to be submitted electronically by 2005. If it cannot get its act together better than that, the postage stamp and envelope are here for a long time yet.
Robin Rose
High Green Farming Ltd, High Street Farm, Severn Stoke, Worcester.
Compensation for lost income
I write with the greatest sympathy for those farmers whose stock contracted foot-and-mouth and received compensation and those caught in the surrounding cull.
Some of the hardest hit victims are the farmers who have incurred the penalties of no income since the outbreak began with no prospect of extra income for some time to come. Also there is the additional cost of paying for extra fodder or corn, not to mention the increased costs of having to employ a vet for farm visits. Where do they get their compensation?
David Prince
david@highfieldhousefarm.fsnet.co.uk
The forgotten victims of F&M
I object to you supporting the whingeing about foot- and-mouth compensation rates (Opinion, Apr 27). There is a recognised procedure which will update compensation rates if, when restocking starts, the cost of equivalent quality animals is substantially higher than the compensation received. Some of the early cases have already used that system.
The ones who need your sympathy are the rest of the industry in the infected areas and especially those under form D restrictions. I sympathise with those who have lost their bloodlines for ever but no amount of money will buy those back. But there are many farmers who now wish theyd not bothered with precautions and allowed F&M to get to their farms. Please listen to those of us out here who have been patient until now.
Spare a thought for those whove had to bear many extra costs and seen their stock devalued by 50%. For example: Beef cattle going over 30 months or hoggs with teeth through will make less than half what they were worth on Feb 21.
Derek Coren
Devon.
Wildlife blooms after walk ban
I would like to thank everyone in Dorset for respecting closed footpaths, and staying away from farm land. But, they have given county councils a big and messy problem – dog mess. People are rightly walking their dogs on roads and parks, which have given rise to the problem.
Perhaps the public and the councils will now appreciate what difficulties farmers have with the subject. Dogs carry worms, and if not treated, can cause sheep farmers, like us, serious problems.
Since all the footpaths were closed, wildlife has returned to places not regularly seen before for many years, and in greater numbers. Hedgerows are full of nesting birds; river banks, next to paths, have wildfowl nesting. This can only be good news for farmers, as it proves we are not totally to blame for damage to wildlife.
People moving in the countryside have affected wildlife in the past and they must take some blame for environmental damage. I think it would be a good idea to limit access to the countryside from March to the end of May. The right to roam policy will also affect wildlife. It is a shame organisations cannot get into the countryside to record wildlife numbers and movement during this unfortunate period of no access.
Lastly, we would like to say how sad it has been over recent months to see fellow farmers suffer such dreadful heartache and loss. We are thinking of you all and wish you the best of luck.
Richard & Lucy Mayo
rj.lemayo1.cokersfrome@virginnet.co.uk
New skills even more essential
With more than a third of farmers planning to at least scale back their farming activity after foot-and-mouth, and many to quit altogether (News, May 4) there has never been a better time to focus in on the skills farmers will need in the future. Skills to help them maximise profit, add value or reskill for a new career.
Your feature (May 4) about how the Westmoreland County Agricultural Society is helping to train farmers in food hygiene, internet surfing, and computer languages was just the sort of initiative we need to encourage.
Farm minister Nick Brown has officially announced a big shift to a greater role for farmers as rural stewards (News, May 4). As an environmentalist working on rural and community issues, I welcome this. But it presents challenges on the skills and advice front. Training and advice will be needed to help farmers move from a food-orientated role to more countryside stewardship and environmental protection. Big challenges ahead then – not only for the usual suspects like LANTRA but also for government offices, regional development agencies, the Countryside Agency, and learning and skills councils. Training and skills is an area that is too often under re-sourced.
Jacqui Cuff
Rural and community development adviser, Biggleswade, Beds.
Clarifying law on occupancy
Your article on agricultural occupancy (Features, Apr 20) omitted an important point in relation to the removal of these conditions. In considering the need for a condition to remain in force, it is the need for an agricultural dwelling in the area and not just on the particular farm that is relevant.
Although there is no statutory definition of the area, a local authority interpretation may be found in their local plan. In most cases the catchments of estate agencies and local newspapers are considered sufficient. A marketing exercise is the normal means of establishing the demand in the surrounding area for agricultural dwellings. Mark Jones states that the required marketing period can vary from one local authority to another.
A note of caution for those considering the certificate of lawful use route. Although a certificate may prevent a local authority from taking enforcement action, it simply means that the breach that is current at the date of the certificate is immune from enforcement. That is there has been a 10 year uninterrupted breach of the condition. It is clear from court decisions the condition might still be capable of coming back into play if the dwelling is reoccupied at some future point by, for example, an agricultural worker.
In these circumstances, fresh non-compliance could be vulnerable to enforcement action, until it was afforded immunity by another certificate. Such a scenario would not arise if the condition were removed.
In considering the removal of a condition, its transfer to another property or any other planning applications, could I commend the services of a chartered town planner? Further details can be obtained from the Royal Town Planning Institute (Tel: 020 7636 9107).
David Glasson
Senior planner, NFU, Agriculture House, 164 Shaftesbury Avenue, London.
Many rules on highway work
Your article on farm access (Features, May 5) implies that anybody can work on the highway. That is misleading. Any work on the highway should be carried out by contractors registered with the local highway authority under the street works legislation. They must have trained staff, proper supervision and adequate insurance.
The highway includes the area either side of the road for a width of 1.2m. Working in this area without the proper authorisation is inadvisable, apart form being a criminal offence.
We have a foot in both camps since as well as being building and civil engineering contractors, we have farmed for many years. The cost of becoming registered as a streetworks contractor is excessive as you need both supervisor and operative training with £5m of public liability insurance.
JH Vaudrey & Son Ltd
School House, Thornham Magma, Eye, Suffolk.