The government was ill-prepared, overwhelmed and, too often, incompetent

Ben Gill President, NFU

The report is the NFU's contribution to the government's inquiry into the lessons to be learned from foot-and-mouth.

Imports of infected meat are seen as the most likely cause of the recent outbreak.

The report says: "The government's contingency plan to deal with FMD did not fully take into account the conclusions and recommendations of the Northumberland Committee report [into the 1967 outbreak]."

It adds that ministers should have learned from the outbreak of swine fever a few months earlier, also blamed on imported meat.

Future plans

The NFU, which wants a review of European Union legislation governing animal and plant imports, makes several recommendations for future contingency planning.

It says farmers and rural economy interest groups should be involved in any review of existing plans, which should be regularly tested through simulation exercises.

The government should provide sufficient disposal capacity for slaughtered animals, using open pyres "only as a last resort".

It also calls for clear command and management structures to tackle a future outbreak, with good communication between government departments and involved agencies, and use of the military where required "at an early stage".

Better advice

The NFU recommends more effective liaison between state vets and civil servants, and a "practical and accessible" licence system to allow exceptional animal movements if restrictions are in place.

And it calls on the government to give "transparent and consistent" advice to farmers, and to investigate where vaccination might be used in future outbreaks.

Britain is now officially disease free

Attacking ministers for a lack of contingency planning before the epidemic, the NFU says a failure to set up simulations beforehand added to delays in getting on top of the disease.

NFU president Ben Gill said: "The lessons of the 1967 outbreak were very clearly ignored in 2001. The government was ill-prepared, overwhelmed and, too often, incompetent. This time they must listen."

He told the BBC: "The number of animals killed could have been as few as half of what we ended up killing, if we had had proper plans."

But the farmers' union does not quarrel with the basic tactics of handling the outbreak.

It says the policy of culling millions of livestock has been vindicated by the fact that the disease has apparently disappeared.

But Mr Gill did say the government was still dragging its feet over foot-and-mouth.

'Farcical' controls

He told the BBC: "Eleven months on from the start of foot-and-mouth... the government still has not properly implemented even the current law on controls of imports of meat and food products coming into the UK."

Recent government action to enforce the controls had been "farcical", he added later, claiming it amounted to "half a dozen A4 posters at Heathrow and Gatwick" airports.

He said a BBC documentary had shown that "perhaps as much as 10 tonnes of illegal meat comes in in suitcases per month through Heathrow alone".

Mr Gill also defended the NFU's rejection of vaccination as a possible solution to foot-and-mouth, although many farmers called for it during the outbreak.

He said wishing for a vaccine and having it practically available with the necessary testing were two different things. More than four million animals were slaughtered as part of the foot-and-mouth cull.

More than two million animals were killed under the Livestock Welfare Disposal Scheme, which deals with animals no longer economically viable to feed or look after or suffering because of restrictions.