Schoolkids still denied British beef

01 December 1998

Schoolkids still denied British beef

By Vicky Houchin

THOUSANDS of schoolchildren are still being denied the opportunity to eat British beef, despite the lifting of the export ban and news that any health risk from beef on the bone has diminished considerably.

Many local authorities are maintaining their policy of not sourcing British beef and, in some cases, they are refusing to serve beef in local schools at all.

More than 200,000 children in schools administered by Kent County Council are being deprived of the opportunity to eat any British beef products. In Birmingham, a further 164,000 school children are also being deprived beef products.

A spokesman from Surrey County Council also said that no beef products were being given to its school children. The story is the same in York (the home town of NFU president Ben Gill) where 24,800 pupils are banned from eating beef.

The Meat and Livestock Commission has been committed to encouraging local authorities to purchase British beef right from the start of the beef ban, said MLC chairman Don Curry.

“We have had a team of three experts, all with a wide knowledge targeting local authorities,” he said. Regular presentations have been made over the period guaranteeing the safety of British beef.

To combat the problem, the Meat and Livestock Commission (MLC) has carried out a 28 surveys in different authorities of parents attitudes towards British beef. It received only three negative responses.

Don Curry, MLC chairman, said he was now enlisting the support of MPs in an attempt to get beef back into schools. But he is still left with a hardcore of 72 authorities who are refusing to put British beef back on the menu.

In a further attempt to get British food back onto the dinner plate nation-wide Mr Curry has written to local authorities asking them to re-consider their decision of boycotting our beef.

If British beef is good enough for Europe it should be good enough for school children, he said.