Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-05-14-Speech-3-249"
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"en.20030514.10.3-249"2
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"Mr President, I should like to congratulate the rapporteur on his report, which I believe to be an extremely important piece of work. We really are now moving towards a situation where the terrible mass slaughters of the last foot and mouth epidemic really will be a thing of the past.
I am particularly pleased to see that vaccination has been promoted to being a vital tool in the fight against foot and mouth - this shift in emphasis that Commissioner Byrne spoke about. But as far as our own Parliamentary report is concerned, I would like to make sure that we stick with the text agreed in committee, which talks very clearly about vaccination as a tool of first resort. That is the language we used in the report from the Temporary Committee. That is the language of the Royal Society report in the United Kingdom. It is right and appropriate to use that clear and unambiguous language here as well.
I welcome the amendment that supports a change in OIE rules so that there is no longer an automatic incentive to slaughter rather than to vaccinate. But we have recognised that in Britain over 10 million animals were slaughtered, many unnecessarily. Priority was given to narrow economic interests of regaining export status as quickly as possible, regardless of the devastating consequences to the wider rural economy and rural communities.
On mass slaughter, my group has an amendment to delete pre-emptive culling. We believe that the evidence we heard in the foot and mouth inquiry demonstrates that preventive slaughter is not necessary, it is not desirable, it is not economic and it is not efficient. It should not be permitted by this directive.
It may seem a long time ago since we saw the pictures of the burning pyres on the front pages of newspapers in all those Member States affected. Some people have already forgotten that, but the farmers and communities that went through that terrible time have certainly not forgotten it and many are only now beginning to put their lives back together again.
I hope that this report and the Commission initiative will be another step in the process of ensuring that such devastation can never be allowed to happen again, either in the United Kingdom or anywhere else in the European Union."@en1
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