New Variant CJD: Beef Bone Controls (Hansard, 1 March 1999)

§ The Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Lord Donoughue)
My Lords, the beef bone controls are needed to protect public health and to help maintain consumer confidence in beef and beef products. There continues to be great uncertainty about the nature of new variant CJD with relation to BSE and about how susceptible people may be to infection. It is therefore not possible to estimate the current statistical risk of dying from the disease as a result of consuming beef or beef products which have been cooked on the bone.

§ Lord Stanley of Alderley
My Lords, I am trying to thank the noble Lord for that remarkable Answer, because my nanny told me I always had to. Unlike my nanny, who allowed me to have a free choice, do the Government intend to apply the same criteria to all foods and alcohol? Like the chicken, shall I be able to cross the road when I want to?

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, I always listen with respect to what noble Lords opposite say about nannying and the nanny state as they have far more experience than we on this side of the House have. It is not our intention to use a common standard of risk for all 1364 commodities because the situations are not similar; one is not comparing like with like. We attempt to assess degree of risk; however, there is always a very wide statistical range. There is enormous uncertainty about CJD. We know so little about the disease. It is fatal and there is no known treatment. The incubation period is unknown and we have no idea whether or not there is an epidemic ahead. It therefore seems appropriate for governments who have a responsibility to protect public health—and in this case to restore confidence in beef—to apply the proper precautionary principle.

§ Lord Stoddart of Swindon
My Lords, exactly how many people have died since 1986 from CJD/BSE? I refer to deaths that were definitely due to that cause.

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, my noble friend refers to new variant CJD. Up to about 32 people a year die from conventional CJD. The number of deaths from new variant CJD since 1995 has been 38. That is a serious matter.

§ Lord Hooson
My Lords, is the Minister aware that, according to the BBC television news at lunch-time today, His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales knowingly ate beef on the bone at a dinner in Wales yesterday evening? "Knowingly" means that he knew beforehand that the beef was to be cooked on the bone. If he did so, was he thereby committing an offence? If so, what do the Government intend to do about it?

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, I do not know the details of the incident the noble Lord describes and I imagine that he does not either. Enforcement is a matter for the local authority.

§ Lord Monson
My Lords, can the Minister say why the Government are maintaining the ban on beef on the bone while introducing legislation which will facilitate the subjection of 16 and 17 year-olds to risks which are almost certainly several hundred times greater than those incurred by eating beef on the bone?

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, I do not know what those risks are. As I explained, these are not comparisons of like with like. The Government judge each case according to the risk. I have observed that many noble Lords opposite will call for a ban on one thing—for example, genetically modified foods—while complaining about nannying with respect to another. The Government have to take a decision in each case. On this issue we were firmly advised by the former Chief Medical Officer in December 1997. The new Chief Medical Officer has looked again at the issue on the basis of the advice provided by the advisory committee, SEAC, and has recommended that the ban should stay in place. We propose to look at the matter 1365 again in six months. If the risk situation with regard to public health makes it possible to lift the ban, we should he as happy as anyone to see it lifted.

§ Lord Davies of Coity
My Lords—

§ Baroness Carnegy of Lour
My Lords—

§ The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Jay of Paddington)
My Lords, if noble Lords ask their questions shortly, there may be time for the noble Lord, Lord Davies, and the noble Baroness to ask their questions, but I believe it is the turn of this side first.

§ Lord Davies of Coity
My Lords, although the risk in question is all important, can the Minister confirm that because the risk was not taken into account during the period of the previous government our beef industry was so damaged in Europe and the rest of the world that this Government will not allow that to happen again?

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, my noble friend is exactly right. The situation we are in derives from the fact that inadequate measures were taken previously. Measures were taken by the previous government to ban offals and brains in the food chain and to ban gut and meat and bonemeal. A line of control measures was taken by the previous government on exactly the same principle as that on which we have taken the present measures. The difference is that the party opposite, which totally supported the previous control measures, does not support the present ones.

§ Baroness Trumpington
My Lords, having stood in the Minister's shoes in the previous government, perhaps I may say that he talks absolute rubbish when he says that inadequate measures were taken previously. Is there a ban on beef on the bone on the Continent? If there is not, why should we not be able to sell our beef on the bone? Are we selling our beef, whether it is on the bone or not?

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, I am sorry that the noble Baroness thinks that I was talking nonsense. The view that I expressed is shared by many who have investigated this situation, particularly the inadequate controls on infected feed and meat and bonemeal. We await with interest the result of the Phillips inquiry. There is not a ban on the Continent because there is not there the scale of BSE crisis that we have had. We have now had 173,000 cases, which is why we are suffering in this country. The Government have negotiated hard to get the ban on exports of our beef lifted and we have made considerable progress towards that.

§ Baroness Byford
My Lords, farmers around the country will be very disappointed by the Minister's response. Other noble Lords have suggested that there is BSE on the Continent; we are not the only country that has problems with it. We are sympathetic with regard to the uncertainty which the noble Lord expresses. However, does it not seem ridiculous that it is possible to go into one shop and buy cigarettes— 1366 which we know kill people—at the age of 16 while one cannot go into a shop and buy beef on the bone, from which there is a very small risk of dying and about which, as the noble Lord said, there is a great deal of uncertainty? Surely that does not make sense.

§ Lord Donoughue
My Lords, there is no comparison between tobacco and cigarettes, about which the risk is known and where the item one is buying is clear, and beef on the bone where often consumers would not know they were eating it. As far as the farmers are concerned, actions are being taken to restore confidence in beef to help farmers.