Delays frustrate queuing hauliers
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• by Miles Brignall The operators who responded to government calls to help move slaughtered animals to burial sites are finally being deployed after a week that has been full of delays and frustration.
While the trade asso ciations have done their part by putting hundreds of hauliers on stand-by, operations controlled by the Army and the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries (MAFF) have not been running so smoothly.
Delays in the movement of culled cattle and sheep have been hampered by bottlenecks at landfill sites as well as other logistical problems.
As Commercial Motor went to press, John His of the Freight Transport Association reported that vehicles were finally being deployed to the region of Jedburgh on the Scottish borders.
However, hundreds of other operators who had been assembled by the FTA and the Road Haulage Association were still waiting to be called on. His says: "We have about 600 operators on the database and it's been very frustrating for them."
However, several new sites are being prepared for culled animals. They are in Devon, Wales and Northumberland, and the FTA stresses the need for more hauliers to come forward se local trucks can be deployed as soon as instructions come in.
These delays are not the only problem. Farmers were angered when they discovered a truck carrying carcasses to the Epynt site near Brecon was found to be leaking fluids. They have also voiced concerns over the route the vehicle was taking—it was stopped as it passed through the disease-free zone of Carmarthenshire.
MAFF was also forced to shut and disinfect a road in Tewkesbury after waste from infected sheep carcasses was washed onto it. MAFF claims the risk of infection from the leak was "significantly reduced" because the animals had been culled.
• Agriculture minister Nick Brown is expected to ease restrictions on unauthorised movement of animals through diseasefree areas within the next few weeks.