Volume 11: Scientists after Southwood
3. The Tyrrell Report
Publication of the Report
Submission of the Interim Report
Subsequent handling of the Interim Report

Submission of the Interim Report

3.42 Dr Tyrrell presented Mr Andrews (MAFF) and Sir Donald Acheson (DH) with the Interim Report of the Tyrrell Committee on 10 June 1989. He remarked that the Committee felt that they should forward their immediate conclusions on BSE so that there should be no delay in the provision of resources for essential research and getting the projects under way. He stressed that 'slow viruses' lead to slow research, which made it all the more important to avoid unnecessary delays. ¹

Subsequent handling of the Interim Report

3.43 On 13 June, the same day that MAFF and DH publicly announced their intention to introduce the SBO ban for human food, ² Mr Maslin prepared for the MAFF Minister, Mr John MacGregor, the reply to a Parliamentary Question which would announce, among other things, the receipt of the Report. ³ The same day Dr Pickles informed Sir Donald Acheson that Mr MacGregor might want to announce that he had received the Report when he made other BSE policy statements that week, so it was necessary to pass the Report on rapidly to the Health Ministers as well. ⁴

3.44 Accordingly, Sir Donald forwarded the report to the Secretary of State for Health, Mr Kenneth Clarke. Sir Donald remarked that 'a large number of research areas are allocated high priority and this work will be laborious, time consuming and expensive'. Since MAFF had the most difficult issues to deal with, Sir Donald suggested that the DH comply with whatever Mr MacGregor proposed about handling the Report, including publication if necessary. ⁵

3.45 On 14 June 1989, Mr Cruickshank of MAFF minuted Mr Andrews, informing him that the Committee's terms of reference were to advise Departments, meaning that there was no obligation to publish the Report. However, due to its high profile, demands for its publication were expected. ⁶

3.46 Mr MacGregor also received Mr Cruickshank's minute, and was struck by how much work was still to be done interdepartmentally before any decisions could be taken. In particular, some idea of costs was needed before an approach could be made to the Treasury. No work appeared to have been done on this. Mr MacGregor questioned whether mention of the Report needed to be made in an answer to a Parliamentary Question at that stage, and proposed that the announcement should be made a week or two later, by which time people would have had an opportunity to absorb it. Publication should certainly be postponed until such time as everyone internally had been able to read it. ⁷

3.47 Mr Meldrum (the CVO) commented to Mr Andrews that it was not necessary to publish the Report since it did not 'take us very much farther forward'. He was concerned that although the Report covered all aspects of research and development, it did not help with deciding which projects should be funded, since many of them were given high priority. Therefore, he thought funding should not be sought from the Treasury until the Report had been carefully scrutinised by the affected Departments. ⁸

3.48 Mr Andrews told Mr Meldrum 'to proceed in the way you suggest'. He thought it would be difficult to decide not to fund any of the research designated high priority. Further, a Parliamentary Question should not be inspired at that stage. ⁹