The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee (EFRA) is seeking further answers from the responsible Defra minister on the Department’s response to the outbreak of foot and mouth disease (FMD) in Germany in January.
EFRA chair Alistair Carmichael, has written to Defra parliamentary under-secretary, Baroness Hayman of Ullock, with further questions, following an initial letter sent in February, in which the Committee asked the Minister to clarify the timeline of Defra’s response to the report of FMD in Germany.
While this week’s letter thanks the Minister for their response, it states that certain questions were not answered and again requests answers to those questions.
Mr Carmichael asks when Defra’s IT system import of products, animals, food and feed system (IPAFFS) was successfully updated and operating, as intended to reflect the policy change made on January 10, when the outbreak was confirmed.
He also asks the minister what quantity of prohibited goods were able to enter the country in the time between controls being approved and IPAFFS being updated and what steps the Department has taken to track and remove prohibited products, and what assessment the Minister has made of the potential risk posed by these products.
When the Committee sought clarity on the above issues in its evidence session with the Chief Veterinary Officer Christine Middlemiss last week, she stated that she did not know when IPAFFS was updated and was not aware of reports that some consignments were bypassing controls.
Mr Carmichael also reiterated his call for Defra to ensure that Dover Port Health Authority (DPHA) has adequate funding to successfully carry out its integral role in protecting the UK’s biosecurity, pointing out that, at the time of writing, with the end of the financial year less than a month away, no new funding settlement has yet been agreed with DPHA.
The letter asks Baroness Hayman for a response by 21 March, ahead of her appearance before the Committee on May 6.
On Friday, Defra announced a ban on imports of susceptible products from Hungary and Slovakia, after a new outbreak in Hungary.
FMD concerns
EFRA’s initial letter was prompted by hard-hitting evidence delivered to it during a hearing in February. The MPs were told that meat and dairy products from Germany continued to enter the UK for days after the government announced a ban.
Helen Buckingham, an Environmental Health Practitioner and regulatory consultant, said, after the import regulations were changed on January 11, the government’s IPAFFS import notification system took another seven days to adjust.
“In that time, things got through and that is fairly remarkable,” she said. “I was getting calls from inland authorities saying: “I have just had some German whey product turn up. What do I do with it?”
Lucy Manzano, DPHA’s head of port health and public protection, said she was aware that, ‘for at least six days’ after the ban came in, German products within scope of the FMD controls were able to auto-clear via the ‘timed-out decision contingency feature’ (TODCOF) system.
A Defra spokesperson said the government it will ‘do whatever it takes to protect our nation’s farmers from the risk posed animal diseases’, like FMD. “We ensured that auto-clearance facilities were superseded by robust biosecurity controls which were implemented at pace following confirmation of the outbreak,” she said.
They explained that, on January 10, PHAs and local authorities were requested to immediately hold impacted consignments at BCPs and that it issued communication to traders notifying them of the controls and worked with individuals that had consignments held at points of entry.
IPAFFS was updated on January 15, and PHAs were instructed to check and hold suspected consignments in the meantime.
Defra said it took ‘further digital action’ to ensure that the Goods Vehicle Movements Systems (GVMS) was signalling drivers who were carrying impacted loads to attend the nominated border control post (BCP), ‘further protecting UK biosecurity’, and continued to offer regular guidance updates to those who needed it.
DPHA funding
Ms Manzano also warned that if DPHA’s funding is not secured for the next financial year, starting in April, checks for illegal meat imports will have to stop because the local authorities are not in a position to fund them,” she said.
Defra told Pig World it had already put a funding proposal to DPHA and that it ‘remained committed to agreeing an appropriate funding model for 2025/26 with DPHA to help tackle illegal imports’.