UK wins few allies in bid to lift beef ban

Date: 25/06/1998

By Myles Neligan

LONDON faces an uphill struggle in its bid to get the two-year-old ban on UK beef exports relaxed after winning the support of just two countries in talks between chief veterinary officers from all 15 EU member states.

Only Ireland and Sweden indicated that they would back the European Commission's proposal to ease the ban on exports from mainland Britain at a meeting late last week.

The Standing Veterinary Committee decided to delay voting on the issue until the UK government provides further details on the controls that will be built into its proposed export scheme.

Observers doubt that the vets will be ready to take a vote at their next meeting on 7 July, given the question marks raised by other member states over the plan, and believe it will be some months before a final decision is taken.

Many governments want assurances that the UK authorities can trace the parents of animals which would be eligible for export, so as to rule out the possibility of maternal transmission of BSE.

They are also demanding guarantees that export-certified meat would be processed in segregated slaughterhouses and storage facilities.

In addition, a number of EU governments, including Germany, have requested that the Commission carry out inspections of UK meat-processing plants before the EU chief veterinary officers vote on the proposal to lift the ban on animals born after August 1996.

But the Commission has turned down this request on the grounds that there would be little point in carrying out inspections until the UK has put its new system in place.

“We would of course thoroughly inspect UK facilities before any exports of UK beef resume. But there will be nothing to inspect until the UK gets a positive signal from the other member states,” said a Commission official.

British officials say there is a “spectrum of opinion” on the issue, with Germany, which is preparing for general elections in the autumn, leading opposition to lifting the ban.

“We are doing a lot of explaining, because we are being asked a lot of questions,” said one.

Ireland and Sweden are the only two EU countries that are clearly positive. “We are more or less in favour of relaxing the export ban. We have always based our view on the opinion of the EU scientific experts and we are satisfied that given the appropriate safeguards, the present proposal poses no threat to consumers,” said a Swedish agricultural attaché.

Dublin echoes this view. “We wish to resume normal trading in beef and we welcome this latest move,” said a spokesman for the Irish department of agriculture. “There is a lot of work still to be done by the EU veterinary experts, but we believe this proposal is a good starting point.”