UK should escape beef-on-bone ban
30 January 2001
UK should escape beef-on-bone ban
By Philip Clarke, Europe editor
THE UK should be allowed to continue serving up T-bone steaks, despite widespread support among EU farm ministers in Brussels on Monday night (29 January) for a ban.
Proposals to remove of vertebral column from cattle over 12 months old, were favourably received by ministers attending the Farm Council.
Food safety commissioner David Byrne promised to present these proposals tighten up on beef safety in time for the next council on 19 February.
But there could be exemptions for some member states.
Much will depend on the past implementation of the meat and bonemeal ban, and whether this has been policed effectively.
The EUs Scientific Steering Committee has already praised the UK in this respect, and Mr Byrne reiterated that this would be fully taken into account.
“I think we should get away with it,” said one UK observer.
But there could be further exceptions.
“The commission will also examine whether derogations are acceptable for certain member states with a low incidence of BSE,” explained Swedish farm minister and council president, Margareta Winberg.
This watering-down of the plan followed strong representations by several ministers, in particular the Irish and Italians, keen to keep their T-bone steaks.
Irish farm minister Joe Walsh argued that decisions should take account of the risk involved in individual member states.
Mr Byrne accepted this argument, adding that there would be a lot of technical details to thrash out before going ahead with a ban.
In particular, there are questions over where the vertebral column should be removed; in the abattoir, cutting hall or butchers shop.
If it is to be classified as specified risk material, it would have to be collected and destroyed, which would rule out butchers shops.
But then transporting carcasses without their spines would present different problems.
The farm ministers also took a political decision to reclassify mechanically recovered meat as a specified risk material, to ban it from the human and animal feed chain.
And any ruminant fat to be used in animal feed should be heat-treated prior to incorporation.
But calls by some member states to lower the age of compulsory BSE-testing from 30 months to 24 months were not supported.
“With the very small number of BSE positives in animals less than 30 months old, the feeling was that the 30-month limit should remain,” said Mr Byrne.