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Avian Flu

I am grateful to both noble Baronesses for their comments, and for what I read as their general support for the Statement and the fact that it has been made today. As the noble Baroness, Lady Miller of Chilthorne Domer, said, it is impossible to answer all the questions that she and the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, posed in the past few minutes. I shall try to answer as many as I can, and I shall write with the answers that I do not give in the House this afternoon. Let me start by answering some of the questions, not in any particular order. I was asked about the March vote. I am afraid that the noble Baroness has believed everything that she read in this morning’s papers on that. There was no vote in the Standing Committee for the Food Chain in Animal Health on the Belgian proposal for stopping wild bird imports. The letter from the World Parrot Trust was discussed at the meeting in January, and Italy’s suggestion that it should produce a draft response was agreed to. In early February the draft was considered and approved. At that meeting the Belgian delegate said that his Minister would raise the matter with the Environment Council on 10 March, which he did. The Belgian raised the idea of a ban at the Environment Council meeting then. No other member state spoke in support of that plan. The Commission’s view was that a ban was not justified at the time and no ban was proposed or voted on. Since then both the UK and the Commission have been monitoring changes to the global disease situation, and we now agree that a temporary ban is appropriate. On the sharing of airspace, Heathrow’s animal reception centre is not a quarantine centre. Consignments of birds arriving at the facility are usually just checked and forwarded to an approved quarantine centre in the UK or another member state, or re-exported to a third country. To avoid cross-infection between consignments, it is important that they are kept isolated from each other, so they should not share the same airspace. In a quarantine facility or centre consignments are normally kept separately, but in a quarantine facility with a single airspace it is permissible to have two consignments in the same airspace as long as the last consignment into the facility determines when birds are free to leave. I was asked why we should have a review of quarantine. We are not complacent. The current incident shows, as the Statement said, both the risk and the effectiveness of our controls. It is only right to ensure that any controls we have are as effective as possible. As to surveillance in quarantine, we know which birds came from where, and we are investigating where the infection itself came from. On imports, Heathrow and, I believe, two other airports can take in such birds via an animal reception centre. The State Veterinary Service staff are there full time—certainly at Heathrow. Registration of poultry was mentioned, but there has never been a need for a complete register to be kept before. There are lists, of course. We do not want to over-regulate, but we see good reason to create a register now, and have led negotiation of the new directive which contains that requirement. I should point out that it has long been the case that poultry keepers are obliged to report signs of illness in their birds. and must know what to do about serious and other notifiable avian diseases. That includes operating adequate biosecurity. The noble Baroness, Lady Byford, asked about other species. We are aware of cases in tigers in Thailand. The position with regard to pigs is less clear. Apparently, there is some scientific uncertainty in that regard. The noble Baroness asked about disposal of carcasses if that was necessary. Incineration and rendering would be the two methods used. As regards numbers of inspections of quarantine centres, there is an annual inspection of the facilities themselves by a veterinary officer from the SVS. There is also a monitoring of each consignment that goes to a quarantine centre by a local veterinary inspector. I was asked whether the controls are adequate. No consignment can be released from quarantine if there have been any signs of ill health or if any laboratory tests are outstanding. I turn to the questions asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Miller of Chilthorne Domer, about birds dying in gardens. She referred to an unusual incidence of mortality whereby five or more birds are found dead at the same time in the same place. I do not think that a lesser number of bird deaths would be considered unusual. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State invited her Minister of State, Mr Elliot Morley, in September of this year to look at the generic contingency plan, including the part of it based on avian influenza. Both noble Baronesses asked about compensation. Compensation payable at rates discussed with the poultry industry for birds healthy at the time of slaughter does not apply to birds that are infected. So no compensation is payable for birds that are already infected, but it is payable for birds that are not infected. I was asked about the OIE alert dates submitted by the United Kingdom. That occurred on the date of confirmation of the case in Essex which we have heard about—21 October. The letter has been sent by the Chief Veterinary Officer as the delegate to that organisation. I have sought to answer a whole series of questions but all the issues that have been raised do not take away from the fact that this was no disease outbreak. There has been a reported case in quarantine, which is very different. We do not have an outbreak of avian influenza in the UK, we have found it in quarantine, and that is what quarantine is for.