"Government cannot put date on when beef ban will be lifted"

Ban on British Beef May Last Another Year

Agriculture Minister Dr Jack Cunningham has said he cannot not put a date on when the European ban on British beef might be lifted, but it was likely it would be done in a piecemeal way.

The ban might still be in place in a year's time, Dr Cunningham said on BBC TV's On The Record programme.

Dr Cunningham said that fixing a date for a lifting of the ban imposed on British beef in the wake of the BSE scare would "not be sensible, it would not be rational".

Asked whether the ban could still be in place a year from now, Dr Cunningham replied: "That is possible. And indeed the idea that the whole of the ban may be lifted in one go is also something we may need to ask questions about.

"I think it is realistic to expect that the ban may be lifted in a step-wise fashion - some products, some herds, some animals born after a certain day may have the ban lifted but not the whole of the ban being lifted in one go."

Dr Cunningham has been trying to get European acceptance on clearing animals for export that are under ten-months-old but he said the possibility of maternal transmission of BSE had put this in jeopardy.

"We have to now put other measures in place to deal with that so anyone who thinks getting the beef ban lifted in part or in whole is just a question of going across the Brussels and shouting and bawling at them, threatening beef wars, frankly is deluding themselves, as the previous Government did."

MAFF Will Get A New Name

Dr Cunningham also told the programme that the Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food would be given a new name under the reforms he had initiated, but no decision had been taken on what this might be.

The ministry will lose its authority over food safety matters to a new Food Standards Agency and Dr Cunningham said there would be "fundamental reforms" to help it reflect rural industries and countryside affairs.

"We are opening up MAFF in a way that has never happened before, to direct dialogue with people and we are going to change the name and we are consulting on all those things including the new name."

Dr Cunningham said he did not think it right to close the ministry down altogether.

"We do want to make fundamental changes, there will still have to be a ministry, or part of a ministry...for food production, for rural affairs and for those countryside activities related to the rural economy and farming."