Infectious Diseases in Livestock (Hansard, 16 July 2002)

§ Lord Whitty

We are delighted that the Royal Society has today published the report of its independent Scientific Review of Infectious Diseases in Livestock. Copies will be placed in the Library of the House.

This report was commissioned by the Government following the unprecedented outbreak of foot and mouth disease last year. We are very grateful to Professor Sir Brian Follett and his committee for producing such a thorough and excellent report in such a short space of time. This is a very significant contribution to our work to strengthen our ability to guard against and deal with animal disease.

We welcome the importance that the report places on the livestock industry in this country and Great Britain having animal disease free status. We are already taking action on imports and disease surveillance to protect this and the report's views on these matters will be of great assistance.

More widely, we intend to press ahead with an animal health and welfare strategy and will need to consider carefully the recommendations made by the report on research and development in the light of yesterday's spending review announcement.

The report's recommendations will be of crucial importance in developing the Government's emergency preparedness for controlling animal diseases, and we will need to study these closely, in particular the recommended approach to vaccination against foot and mouth disease. The Government have never rejected vaccination as an option in the fight 140WA against foot and mouth. The report recognises that there are aspects of vaccination, in particular trade and technical issues, which are not yet resolved but which can and should be resolved. Even then, vaccination will not necessarily be a panacea and will not necessarily be right in all circumstances. The report notes that, even with emergency vaccination in place, culling would still be necessary.

We welcome the Royal Society's endorsement of the need to take forward the work we have in hand on a greatly improved contingency plan for foot and mouth. Its findings on biosecurity and animal movements will also be of particular importance.

In taking work forward on the report, we will need to involve stakeholders, in particular the farming industry, who have a share in the responsibility for maintaining the animal disease free status recommended by the report.

We intend to give a fuller initial response on the recommendations in this report when the lessons learned inquiry has reported on Monday 22 July. It is also intended later in the year to issue a detailed reply to the recommendations in both these independent reports.