Livestock farming unites in call for re-think on cost sharing‏

We, the undersigned organisations representing the livestock industry throughout the United Kingdom, call on the government to urgently reconsider proposed measures on cost sharing for animal diseases.

If government is determined to unload some of its current spending on animal health and welfare on to the livestock industry, the costs involved can and must be significantly reduced. This must be the starting point for any discussion.

The government has announced that it is launching a consultation on this issue in England before Christmas; the timing could not be worse. Beef, sheep and pig producers throughout GB have been saddled with enormous additional costs, at least £100 million according to the government's own figures, as a result of an outbreak of Foot & Mouth Disease caused by a leak from a laboratory that is ultimately the responsibility of the government.

This comes at a time when the whole of the livestock sector is in severe economic crisis because prices have not adjusted to steep increases in feed, energy and regulatory costs. To suggest now that the industry should be picking up additional costs from government is divorced from reality.

As the industry recovers from these challenges, many not of its own making, the first step must be to ensure that this work is managed as efficiently as possible. If the industry is given genuine responsibility for the development and delivery of animal health policy and the way animal disease outbreaks are handled, we can then look reasonably at how this is paid for.

These are complicated issues that cannot be rushed. It should be important for all sides to get the right solution.

We call on the Secretary of State to call a meeting at which we can discuss a more sensible approach.