FOOT-AND-MOUTH DISEASE. (Hansard, 3 June 1926)

§ LORD STRACHIE
My Lords, some weeks ago I gave notice to the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture that I proposed to draw attention to the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease caused by the importation of pigs from Holland. I am very glad to see that since that date the Minister of Agriculture has taken prompt action and I congratulate him upon his having now entirely forbidden the introduction into this country of swine from abroad. I should like, however, to request him, if he will be good enough to do so, to consider other causes of infection. It is the belief amongst farmers generally that the disease is not only introduced by swine coming into this country but also by skins being allowed to come in.
It is undoubtedly very fortunate that the cause of the infection was discovers, I in this particular case, but there are a great many agriculturists, as my noble friend knows, who are perfectly certain that foot-and-mouth disease is introduced into this country in various ways—through skins, through hay and straw and through vegetables which are largely used in feeding animals. Agriculturists would like to see a thorough investiga- 247 tion of the matter. A statement was made a few years ago by the Ministry of Agriculture that they believed that infection was brought into this county by birds. It is significant that we had no outbreak during the War, which shows that the disease is imported from abroad by various means. The Minister of Agriculture has now taken his courage in both hands and done his best to deal with the situation, but I hope we shall have an assurance from the noble Lord, the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry, that his Department will investigate further into the causes of infection and see if something more cannot be done to stop this dreadful plague to agriculture in this country.
I would point out that it is not only a serious matter to farmers but it is also very serious to the ratepayers and taxpayers of this country, who have had to spend millions of money in trying to stamp out disease, though up till now that expenditure has been practically useless. I hope that what has already been done will not prevent the Ministry of Agriculture from taking action with regard to other causes of outbreaks in this country.

§ THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (LORD BLEDISLOE)
My Lords, before I reply to the noble Lord's question I should like to refer with very deep regret to the loss by death yesterday of the two men who were most prominent in the public eye in connection with foot-and-mouth disease, first of all, in the field of administration, and secondly, in research. I am sorry to say that Sir Stewart Stockman, the Chief Veterinary Officer of the Ministry of Agriculture for the past twenty-one years, died yesterday in Scotland and on the same day Sir William Leishman, the Chairman of the Foot-and-Mouth Disease Investigation Committee, died in London. I am sure your Lordships will realise that by the death of these two men we have lost very able research workers and administrators and the loss so far as my Department is concerned is a very serious one.
The noble Lord has raised a question of very great gravity and I think it would probably be in accord with your Lordships' wishes that I should give a short account of what has happened in Scot- 248 land during the last few days. As the noble Lord has raised the question of a possible prohibition upon the import of hay and straw and other materials, I should like to say that there are very considerable administrative difficulties in making Orders in relation to such packing material other than what has already been done under the Hay and Straw Packing Orders of a few months ago, under which, as your Lordships will remember, all hay and straw that has been used in packing imported merchandise must not be brought into contact with animals and if brought upon farms at all must be destroyed by fire.
On May 22 foot-and-mouth disease appeared on the sewage farm at Carluke, Lanarkshire, after Scotland had been free from the disease for two years. I may perhaps mention that in response to representations from the breeders of pedigree cattle in Scotland we have been making a big effort for some time to get importing countries to make a distinction as between Scotland on the one hand and England and Wales on the other, so as to permit of the admission into those countries of pedigree stock from Scotland even when England and Wales are seriously affected by the disease. Now, unfortunately, the disease has become somewhat prevalent in Scotland. Inquiries by the Ministry of Agriculture's inspectors have elicited the fact that a local bacon factory had been in the habit of receiving from Holland weekly consignments of pig carcases for curing, and on May 24 the disease was actually found to exist in carcases which had that day been received from the s.s. "Lanrick" from Leith. Some of these carcases were found to have been consigned through Rotterdam from Belgium. Other carcases of the same consignment from Rotterdam to Leith were found to be diseased on examination at Kilmarnock, Ayrshire, at Carlisle, and at Thornhill, Dumfriesshire, on May 26 and 27 respectively.
There is no doubt whatever that the disease in the first case at Carluke was conveyed from the bacon factory either by means of sewage or by human agency. Ten outbreaks in all have been confirmed in and around Carluke. The probability is that the germs of the disease were contained in the washings from the bacon factory which were carried on to 249 the sewage farm, which is a pasture farm, and that the cattle grazing upon that farm took the disease into their systems through grazing upon the tainted grass. At, first there was a difficulty in identifying the origin of the infected carcases upon this steam, ship because the labels had been removed from the carcases. Inquiry, however, proved later that the carcases from that vessel which showed lesions were those of Belgian pigs and the same pigs were found at Carluke, Kilmarnock, Carlisle and Thornhill. Subsequently carcases from the steamer "Bernica at Newcastle from Rotterdam were found to be diseased at a Carlisle bacon factory on May 31 and these undoubtedly were carcase of Dutch origin. The s.s. "Schok land" arrived at Leith from Rotterdam on May 31 and landed carcases, some of which were also found on examination on the quay to have suffered from foot-and-mouth disease. Special precautions were taken as regards disinfection and the Minister at once, by Order, required the immediate return to the vessel for re-exportation of all cargo which had been landed there from. The consignment from this vessel in which the infected carcases were found came from Belgium.
These occurrences have definitely established one of the most dangerous sources of the introduction of foot-and-mouth disease into Great Britain and after careful consideration the Government has decided that there is really no alternative but to prohibit the importation of carcases front the Continent as the only means of preventing this risk. Perhaps I ought to mention, as suggestions have been made in the Press and elsewhere that possibly drastic inspection on one side or the other of the North Sea or possibly on both sides would produce the desired result, that in the opinion of our expert advisers inspection would not be sufficient to prevent the possibility of disease germs getting into this country, the reason being that the latency or incubation of the disease is of a considerable period and many animals arrive which, although showing no lesions of the disease at all, are very seriously affected. In fact, the disease is more easily communicable when in a state of incubation than when the lesions are to be found upon the animals themselves.
250 As a result of this discovery an Order has been made by the Minister of Agriculture in pursuance of his powers under the Diseases of Animals Act, 1891, entitled the importation of Carcases (Prohibition) Order, 1926. This Order will take immediate effect, but provision is made whereby its provisions do not apply to carcases shipped before tonight, that is before midnight on June ¾. The Order prohibits the landing in Great Britain of a carcase or part of a carcase as defined in the Order, brought from any country on the Continent of Europe other than Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. The only exceptions from this prohibition are: (1), fully cured bacon and ham, lard, or rendered fat, cooked or preserved meat or meat essences, and (2), hides and skins which have been dried, dry-salted or wet-salted. In the case of wet-salted hides or skins they must be accompanied by a certificate to the effect that they have been wet-salted for a period of fourteen days.
A question has arisen as to the importation of meat and of meat offals into this country from the Argentine, but as regards meat offals it is only fair to mention that meat offals from the Argentine are treated in such a way as to render them quite innocuous so far as foot-and-mouth disease is concerned, but what I want to impress upon your Lordships is that no system of inspection is really adequate to prevent the very serious danger of bringing foot-and-mouth disease into this country through the importation of these carcases.
As your Lordships may be aware, for many years past porker pigs from Holland have been imported into this country in ever increasing quantities. As a matter of fact, so far as the consumption of pork is concerned, London lives almost exclusively upon Dutch pork, but during recent months a new development has taken place in that the bacon factories of this country and particularly of Scotland—I believe to some extent owing to the very high price of British bacon pigs—have established a custom of importing the carcases of freshly killed bacon pigs from Holland, and that has been a growing trade during the last few months. This has enormously added to the very serious risk 251 of disease coming into this country from that source.
I do not know whether your Lordships would desire me at this moment to give any further particulars, but I can assure the noble Lord who raised this question that the whole matter is being examined most meticulously by the Ministry of Agriculture and all pains will be taken to see that, so far as possible, the introduction of the disease from this and other similar sources is prevented.

§ VISCOUNT HALDANE
My Lords, arising out of the answer which the noble Lord has just given to this question, there is a matter to which I desire to draw his attention. The late Sir William Leishman, a man of great distinction, who had rendered immense service to the health of the Army by his researches into the germs of disease, has passed away and in him we have lost the Chairman of the Committee which dealt with the researches that are being conducted into foot-and-mouth disease. Sir William Leishman was appointed during the time of the late Government. Foot-and-mouth disease appeared in an acute form and we determined that nothing would meet the case except the most exacting and comprehensive research into the origin of the germ and its character. That was the more apposite because of the announcement that Chad just been made that in Germany the bacillus had been identified and was about to be dealt with. How far that proved to be a too sanguine expectation I do not know, but at any rate it was very definitely announced and we determined to appoint a Committee to conduct an investigation of a more detailed character than that which had been embarked upon in the Ministry of Agriculture. The Chairman of that Committee originally was Sir Charles Sherrington, the President of the Royal Society. Unfortunately, after a short time Sir Charles Sherrington broke down and a successor had to be found for him. That successor was Sir William Leishman.
What I have risen to press upon the noble Lord is this. The Committee should not simply go on as it has been going on without further consideration. What we want is the very first bacteriologist in the country that we can find to 252 take the chair, if possible, of that Committee, or at least to serve upon it. It should be somebody who is not only very well known for his energy, acuteness and research into this matter and for his learning, but somebody who can give a great deal of time to the work. The difficulty with Sir William Leishman was that he had many other duties which was discharging admirably at the War Office as head of the Army Medical Department. What we want is somebody who will give his whole time. The literature of this subject is now very large and the amount of research that has to be undertaken is not only very extensive but is to a great extent novel. I hope that when the noble Lord and his colleagues at the Ministry of Agriculture take this matter into consideration they will realise the necessity of securing the very best brains that can be found in the country to do the work.
It is no use appointing an administrator, however able. It is the work of a lifetime to master the science which belongs to the investigation of this germ. It is a very minute germ and very difficult to identify. I do not feel at all sure that it really has been identified, but if it could be, and if the proper antitoxin could be discovered, then it would be possible to treat not only infected animals but articles in such a way that there would be no chance of the disease spreading. At present foot-and-mouth disease is not really a very deadly disease in itself, but it is frightfully contagious and the result is that it spreads right through a whole district, brings down the health of the cattle all round and renders them useless. What we want is, if possible, to close the area in which the disease is found and to treat all the animals in it. That is what one looks forward to as the ideal result of the discovery. But a preliminary to that is the need of research of the very highest order, and I hope that the noble Lord will take into consideration the question of bringing the Committee up to the very highest standard that can be reached by the introduction of the best science in this country. It may cost a little, but the cost will not be more than a fraction of a percentage of what the country has to pay in compensation to those whose cattle have to be slaughtered through this disease.

§ LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM
My Lords, I should like to ask my noble friend a question. I understand that he is going to prohibit, or has prohibited, the import of carcases from the Continent, but that the import of carcases from Ireland is still allowed. Has he taken precautions to prevent: continental people shipping carcases to Ireland to be reshipped to this country?

§ LORD BLEDISLOE
My Lords, as regards the last question I can assure my noble friend that every precaution will be taken against such a development occurring. So far as Ireland itself is concerned there is, so far as we know, no foot-and-mouth disease at present, whereas it is raging at the present time in Holland, Denmark and, to a rather less extent, Belgium.

§ LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM
My noble friend will understand that there is a temptation to make money by doing what I have just suggested, and the Irish Free State people are not likely, perhaps, to resist that temptation.

§ LORD BLEDISLOE
It is because I realise that there is such a temptation that I give the assurance that I have given to the noble Lord. As regards the quest ion of the noble and learned Viscount, I can assure him that we certainly will take into sympathetic and respectful consideration the valuable 254 suggestion that he has made with regard to the appointment of a successor to Sir William Leishman.

§ THE EARL OF STAIR
My Lords, the noble Lord has told us that this practice of importing carcases from Holland has only recently begun. Could he tell us exactly how long it has been going on?

§ LORD BLEDISLOE
I cannot answer the noble Earl with absolute precision. So far as the carcases of mature bacon pigs are concerned, it has been going on roughly for from nine to twelve months, since there has been a serious scarcity of suitable bacon pigs for the requirements of the British bacon factories. As regards the porkers, the younger pigs which, of course, are not cured but killed for consumption as fresh meat, the trade has been conducted off and on since about 1880, and it reached considerable proportions in the first ten or twelve years of this century. Up to last year the maximum number of pigs of this age and description was reached in 1914, but last year the record was reached, and during last year and the early part of this year there have been quite an unprecedented number of young pigs coming to this country, chiefly from Holland, but also to some extent from Belgium, to be consumed as fresh meat.