The announcement last week that British research has shown BSE may be passed from cows to calves threatens to reopen the beef controversy and upset the compromise agreed in Florence which put an end to Britain's policy of non co operation with the European Union. A meeting of German health and farming officials in Bonn yesterday heard a strong case that this latest research throws the selective culling policy being pursued in Britain into question It will take all the skills the Irish Presidency of the EU can muster to prevent the beef war erupting again in such a way as to threaten the smooth operation of the Union's business. The revelation that BSE may be passed on between generations coincided with more far reaching speculation that sheep or goats could be affected or that transmission to milk is possible too.
The Germans have called on the European Commission urgently to investigate milk safety. Although competent scientists have been involved in these discussions it must be said clearly that there is no categorical proof available to sustain such suggestions. Despite intensive research, no infective tissue has been found in milk or in any other tissue than nerve tissue. But it is not difficult to understand the fears created among European consumers as these questions remain unresolved. The latest issue to face agriculture ministers, meeting under the chairmanship of Mr Ivan Yates, is how to respond to the collapse of demand for beef throughout the EU. This has reached figures of 30 to 50 per cent in several states, far more than has been the case in Britain or Ireland. Irrespective of whether BSE has been discovered in national herds, therefore, the material impact of the crisis is truly EU wide.
The agriculture commissioner, Mr Franz Fischler, has proposed a severe culling of calves, quite aside from what is made necessary to remove infected cattle from the food chain, a question which will have to be resolved in coming months. But, as can be seen starkly in the market conditions that have given rise to such a proposal, both ministers and experts have to take consumer confidence extremely seriously. In addition, there are varying national attitudes to public health at play.
Official policy and public opinion in Germany are at one in their insistence that risks must not be taken where there is a suspected or unresolved threat to human health and that it is better to err on the side of caution. Confronted with such an approach, the British government has usually fallen back on a narrowly conceived demand that such threats must be positively established before preventive measures are implemented. Combined with the overwhelming impression elsewhere in the EU that the crisis has been handled incompetently by British ministers, this has been a most unfortunate episode for the reputation of British governmental capacity.
The yawning gap between the two approaches has not been bridged by the Florence compromise, despite agreement that all decisions will be based "only and exclusively" on scientific criteria decided upon by the Commission, because the national veterinary officers who advise it tend to mirror closely attitudes taken by their ministers. The elimination of the disease and public safety must, nevertheless, remain the main priority for all concerned. A replay of the beef crisis running into a British election campaign would be calculated to do maximum damage, not only to the smooth running of EU business, but to public confidence in the Union as a whole.