'Good progress' on foot and mouth recommendations: report

The National Audit Office (NAO) has delivered a report on the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs' (Defra) progress in implementing recommendations made after the 2001 Foot and Mouth outbreak.

The report found that good progress had been made on most recommendations, but pointed out that further work is needed in some key areas.

The NAO said that an essential computer systems upgrade, to help manage an outbreak, still had to be completed, while more work was needed on a contigency plan to involve local authorites.

Foot and mouth disease was confirmed in the UK at an abbatoir in Essex in February 2001. More than six million animals were slaughtered by the time the disease was eradicated in September.

The NAO also found that the European Commission had only agreed to pay compensation of £350 million, following the 2001 outbreak – only a third of Defra's initial claim for £960 million. This, the report stated, was because the Commission concluded that UK culled animals were valued at between two and three times the Commission's assessment of the likely market value.

Defra has consulted on a new compensation scheme, which would apply standard rates, based on average market values prior to an outbreak, although the report said that the department was still considering proposals to make the farming industry share the cost of an outbreak.

Defra has paid 97% of invoices, amounting to around £1.3 billion, submitted by contractors since the outbreak, but it admitted that 57 contractors were still awaiting a final settlement, pending the results of its investigations. A number of cases are currently awaiting legal action.

Defra has taken steps to reduce the risk of the foot and mouth virus entering the country through illegal meat imports and to slow the potential initial spread of infection, through improved farm biosecurity and restrictions on the movements of animals. The report also stated that the department had taken steps towards securing sufficient veterinary resources to deal with an outbreak quickly and also said that its contigency plan was "one of the best available".

Commenting on the report, NAO Chief, Sir John Bourn, said: "The 2001 outbreak of foot and mouth was devastating, not only for many farmers, but also for the wider rural community. Continued vigilance is therefore essential. Defra is now much better prepared than in 2001, but still has work to complete."

(KMcA/SP)