LOSSES suffered by the beef sector because of the BSE crisis will exceed the Pounds 86 million EU compensation offer, the Minister for Agriculture has said.
Already, losses ran into "dozens of millions" and more compensation would be sought from next year's EU budget, said Mr Yates who yesterday hosted a press conference for his British counterpart, Mr Douglas Hogg.
Mr Hogg, after a two hour meeting with Mr Yates, said that while it would be difficult to quantify losses to the British exchequer, his government had already spent Pounds 2.5 billion gross on measures to deal with the problem over a three year period.
The Ministers agreed EU beef consumption would not recover and "grave decisions", said Mr Yates, would have to be made later in the year on the EU beef regime.
Their discussions had focused on how the beef industry would develop, said Mr Hogg. The Government had always been very constructive in helping Britain with the BSE problem and Mr Hogg was very grateful for that help.
The framework agreement agreed at the Florence Summit had helped move the issue forward and he hoped that when the Commission saw what Britain had done, this would lead to a phased removal of the British beef ban.
"I would like to think that we could see a very serious relaxation of the ban in the course of the latter part of this year and Irish do have a very important part to play in the sense that they have the presidency," he said.
Mr Yates was anxious for progress on the issue during the presidency and wanted an all island approach to evolve when the British government submitted its proposals.
"Different countries have differing viewpoints about this issue. Ours is that science, rather than politics, should decide," said Mr Yates.
Asked about the links between the new type of CJD, the human form of BSE, and the animal disease, Mr Hogg said the numbers involved were modest.
"But the working assumptions are, as it was when the statements on the issue were made last March in the Commons, mainly that the most likely explanation of the small number of CJD cases was exposure to BSE before 1988," he said.
"That is the working assumption but it has to be said that that connection has not been proved," he said.
Referring to the rift caused between Britain and the rest of Europe because of BSE, the Minister asserted the British had always been good Europeans, wholeheartedly engaged in Europe.
"But we do not want to support policies which are more integrationist in character, and consequently, we will resist policies designed to remove from nation states responsibilities they have to take for policies over their own citizens," he said.
Mr Yates will visit Libya on July 15th-16th to help revive that market.