THE BACKGROUND

Most investigations are based upon three basic principles: facts, series of events and speculation. Once the facts become clearer combined with the events, then the evidence can be accessed, and generally a conclusion can be reached.

The UK's recent and disastrous FMD outbreak is unprecedented. It is, and will continue to cause untold misery for thousands of people in farming, the tourist industry and rural businesses. The economic cost to the country will be in the billions of pounds and the ripple effect could have resounding consequences on the whole nation that could well culminate in a full blown recession later this year.

I have been personally moved and greatly disturbed by what is happening in our countryside by this awful disease, because I remember the 1967 outbreak only too well. I have also been very watchful of what the authorities have been doing over the past few weeks in their attempt to stop FMD spreading, and what the authorities have been or intend doing to prevent the disease from continuing to enter our island now or in the future. Because we ARE an island one would think we have a better 'chance' of not catching a dreadful disease such as Foot and Mouth than mainland Europe - but I'm sorry to say that is not the case. We have a terrible record in the UK - which is all part of the same regime that perpetuates my so-called 'Rip-Off Britain'. Our overall safety record on so many issues and on-going catastrophes is abysmal.

As the spread of FMD continues unabated, although the task now at hand is awesome and logistically beyond comprehension, I am not at all impressed with the way the FMD outbreak was handled or reported on the 19th of February 2001. Perhaps officials did not realise the scale of the outbreak and how fast, far and wide it was going to spread. Only today (28/03/01) did the Prime Minister announce that there were possibly 1.3 million movements of susceptible animals throughout the country prior to the outbreak. This is an incredible indictment of pure and utter folly on the part of Government to protect our interests, and our safety.

My interest in the FMD outbreak occurred on the 25th February when I spoke with a relative of mine who had attended and was privy to all MAFF meetings. He shall remain nameless for obvious reasons. When he told me that MAFF suspected that the outbreak was caused by pig swill that had been possibly been collected from Newcastle Airport and the surrounding district, but no media or Government releases were made upon this speculation, I then started to investigate the possibilities of HOW and WHAT caused the outbreak.

The further I dug the more suspicious I became that there might be either a cover-up or complete incompetence over the whole matter. My suspicions were heightened when the media reported that MAFF had been in contact with the timber merchant PRIOR to the outbreak being announced. Coupled with my investigation of what enforcement there currently exists governing imported meat products and how in-flight galley waste is handled I commenced to publish my findings on the 14th of March. Despite emailing various media, MP's and Government departments my investigation fell on deaf ears until the announcement of the 'proposal' to ban pig swill by Nick Brown on the 27th of March - over one month AFTER MAFF were obviously aware of the potential problem.

I do not propose to offer a solution towards my investigation, or the evidence below. Any intelligent person bothering to read it in it's entirety will quickly come to their own conclusions!

THE EVIDENCE

19th February 2001: A routine veterinary inspection at the Cheale Meats abattoir in Little Warley, south of Brentwood, Essex, discovers "highly suspicious" signs of foot-and-mouth disease in 27 pigs.

FACT: In early December 2000 MAFF contacted a timber merchant in Staffordshire, and others nationwide, and made enquiries regarding the available stocks of railway sleepers and other timber supplies. When this story broke in early March 2001, questioned by the media, MAFF admitted they had indeed contacted the timber merchant and stated "phone calls that were made to timber merchants were part of a regular contingency planning process, and they were merely updating their list of suppliers" (sic. in case there was an outbreak of FMD because railway sleepers are often used as combustible material for mass burning pyres). The timber merchant who originally divulged MAFF had contacted him, rebutted by stating "there had been no contact from MAFF since the last outbreak in 1967 when his father had run the business". The business had in fact stopped trading in that type of timber many years before!

Do not the above circumstances indicate that MAFF had knowledge of a potential or actual FMD outbreak some 75 days prior to the first outbreak being reported?

A farmer tells Farmers for Action Group that when he visited New Zealand in November, he was asked to show all his luggage, when he asked why he was told by customs that they were doing this on instruction from their Min of Ag, as the UK had or were about to have FMD.

26 Feb 2001Full Story Call for ban on port feed use The National Beef Association has called for an immediate ban on food waste taken from airports and docksides entering animal feed systems It is alarmed that food scraps, some which could contain the remnants of meat products manufactured in countries known to have reported foot-and-mouth infections, can be legally picked up by pig farmers and fed to their animals in heat-treated swill. "The Ministry of Agriculture has said that the break-out of FMD that is paralysing the livestock industry and the distribution chain for domestic meat has almost certainly been triggered by infected meat products entering the UK illegally," said NBA chief executive Robert Forster, from Riding Mill, Northumberland. "However it must consider the possibility that it may have been caused by contaminated meat with origins in the Near East, Asia or other FMD infected areas becoming part of the waste food collection system at a busy port or airport and not being properly heat-treated if it has been taken back to a farm to be fed as pig swill." "It is appalling that a loophole as obvious as this was not blocked years ago and we are certain that the entire livestock industry will back our demands that it must be shut down now."

Clearly, the authorities were aware of the pig swill and airport waste issue early on - but did nothing.

27 Feb 2001 Full Story Brown tight-lipped on cause of deadly plague Nick Brown was last night refusing to be drawn into speculation about what caused the foot and mouth outbreak in Northumberland amid claims foreign food was to blame. Burnside Farm, at Heddon-on-the-Wall is believed to have been the source of the infection that has since spread to 12 other farms across England. Veterinary experts believe the disease has been present for at least two to three weeks at the pig fattening unit near Newcastle. But Agriculture Minister Mr Brown last night ducked MPs questions on how the disease arrived in Northumberland in the first place. His Tory shadow, Tim Yeo, asked him to comment on suggestions it had arisen as a result of the pig swill the animals were fed at the centre. "Was the farm in Northumberland feeding the pigs on swill that was supplied by airports who could have been buying food from overseas?" he asked. Newcastle East MP Mr Brown replied that he had asked officials to draw up a list of potential sources, but refused to answer the specific question.

28 Feb 2001 Full Story Last night a spokesman for Gateshead Council said it was impossible for any infected overseas meat to have originated from their meals. He said : "We only use British meat of prime quality and from a reputable butcher in Ponteland who is a member of the National Association of Catering Butchers. "We do not use imported meat. No imported meat goes from us to the Waughs."

28 Feb 2001 Full Story Foreign meat theory for British outbreak As the national crisis surrounding the foot-and-mouth outbreak spreads to the continent and the nation teeters on the verge of an epidemic. As experts from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food carry out extensive detective work to trace the movement of suspected infected animals over the past few weeks, other scientists are seeking to pinpoint the precise cause of the outbreak. So far it has been determined that the foot-and-mouth bug is almost certainly the virulent pan-Asiatic O type, which is highly infectious. It can be carried in the air up to 40 miles over land and over 180 miles by sea, and can be transferred by humans, animals, vehicles and farm implements. The strain is believed to have originated in South-East Asia, before spreading to the Middle East and India. Now farmers and scientists want to know how it reached the UK and managed to infect animals in the North-East, the suspected seat of the national outbreak. Experts and farmers' representatives said it was most likely to have come from infected meat which made its way into the UK, and was then passed on to pigs. The infected meat could have inadvertently been fed directly to the animals, or been eventually passed on to them in food waste from restaurants and schools, which is heated and prepared into a feed commonly known as "pigswill".

1st March 2001 UK continues to import meat from the following countries where FMD is endemic: Argentina , Brazil , Greece , Namibia , S Africa, Swaziland , Zambia , Zimbabwe

12 Mar 2001 Full Story There seems to be little doubt that infected meat brought the disease here. Given the lax way the import regulations seem to be applied there would appear to be no difficulty in getting doubtful material into Britain. I have a copy of a letter sent to me by a butcher regarding checks on imported meat. This letter from his district council came at the instigation of the Food Standards Agency and warns that because of foot-and-mouth "it is likely imports of meat will rise considerably. Much of the increase is expected to be from countries affected by BSE. I would advise you to confirm with your supplier the country of origin of any imported meat and seek assurances of compliance with BSE control measures". Surely if the FSA is anything other than a toothless tiger, it should insists checks are made long before meat reaches a country butcher and the butcher should never be expected to do their policing for them. It is admitted that the British Army is routinely fed on imported meat, some of which is from Uganda which last year suffered a foot-and-mouth epidemic of a similar strain to the one currently affecting British livestock. We have a local barracks whose waste is consigned to local landfill sites, as is the waste from the local airport and port. We thus have another potential danger zone. No matter how carefully waste is disposed of in landfill sites, one has only to look at the flocks of gulls which congregate there to realise there must be something to attract them. As well as waste from these and similar sources, a Heathrow Airport spokesman says: "We routinely detect illegal raw meat imports of about half a ton per flight from some African countries such as Nigeria." What we need for our future protection is a change in attitude from Government. For years cheap food has been the aim. This has been achieved by unscrupulous traders scouring the dustbins of the world, abetted by a strange reluctance to apply bans to these imports by those who have the powers to do so.

13 Mar 2001 Full Story Two pig farmers were observed collecting bins full of unprocessed pig swill from a police training centre and taking it back to their farm. Alan Hall Clement, 57, and his son Kenneth Alan Clement, 29, both of West Craig Lea, Roddymoor, Crook, County Durham, admitted one charge each of bringing unprocessed catering waste on to their farm when they appeared before Bishop Auckland magistrates yesterday.

26th March - Ms Quin MP: "Meat imported from other European Union countries may circulate freely within the single market, but is subject to random checks at the point of destination within the United Kingdom"

27 Mar 2001 Full Story The man at centre of disease outbreak revealed no one has interviewed him over feed sources. Farmer Bobby Waugh claimed that six weeks into the foot and mouth crisis no official had yet interviewed him. Despite his Burnside Farm in Heddon, Northumberland being the probable source of the outbreak Mr Waugh, 55, said no one from the Government had quizzed him over the disease. He said: "I know it sounds incredible but no one from MAFF or the Office of Trading Standards has come to me and asked me how the thing started. "It's madness, how can they track down how the whole thing began if they don't ask me where I got my pig feed from and that sort of thing? "I must be the only person I know who has been charged and found guilty without even being interviewed. "They say they are doing everything to crackdown on this, it's a load of rubbish and a pack of lies." A spokeswoman for MAFF said: "I am not prepared to discuss what we may have or have not done as part of our inquiries. It may seem like a fair question but I will not comment Ron Clarke, spokesman for Northumberland County Council said: "We are carrying out an ongoing investigation and it would be inappropriate to comment further." But another Northumberland farmer Richard Thornton said: "I must admit I am surprised no one has spoken to Mr Waugh. It would seem that there would be one or two questions he should have been asked at least." Mr Waugh also rubbished claims that foot and mouth could have been caused by contaminated foreign meat used in Chinese food. The Government was rumoured that they were to announce that infected meat smuggled in for the restaurant trade may have sparked the outbreak.

Some portions of articles above appeared in the Northumberland News