Volume 14: Responsibilities for Human and Animal Health
2. Identification and control of animals showing symptoms of disease
Enforcement

2.34 As noted above, the duty of executing and enforcing the provisions of the Animal Health Act and of every Order of the Minister was placed on the police force of each police area by section 60(1). Powers of detention, search, entry and apprehension were given to constables for this purpose. But section 62 gave the same powers (apart from those relating to rabies) to 'inspectors', and section 52 required every local authority ¹ to appoint as many inspectors and other officers as it thought necessary to execute and enforce the Act. In practice, the inspectors concerned would have been the trading standards officers employed by those authorities.

2.35 However, section 63(8) in turn gave an 'inspector of the Minister' the same powers as those of inspectors, while subsection (9) granted the Minister's inspectors the additional power of entry to land or buildings where they thought animals had been held, to ascertain whether disease was present, or had been present. Section 65 gave the Minister's inspector the further additional power to detain vessels, vehicles or aircraft. Thus, the widest and most effective powers were given to inspectors appointed by the Minister of Agriculture, notwithstanding the apparent similarity of the responsibilities placed on the police and local authorities.

2.36 In practice, these enforcement powers were executed by Veterinary Officers (VOs) of the Veterinary Field Service (VFS), the statutory arm of the State Veterinary Service. The VFS dealt with notifiable diseases, the protection of animal welfare, facilitating the export of animals and animal products through the control of notifiable disease and the provision of export certification verifying the status of the exported commodity, as well as meat hygiene and slaughterhouse inspection duties. According to Dr Matthews, the duties of VOs varied according to specialism, training and demand. His particular responsibilities were primarily in the area of disease control (notifiable diseases only), monitoring of licensed waste food plants and rendering plants. He explained further:

As a VO I was personally involved in such episodes involving the eradication of swine vesicular disease in 1979, where whole herd slaughter of pigs was practised, and Aujeszky's disease in 1983/4 where despite an initial policy of whole herd slaughter there was an eventual change to partial herd slaughter followed by further testing . . . My role in such investigations would be to inspect and sample pigs, and, after confirmation that infection was present, to carry out the epidemiological investigation into the outbreak, trace origins and possible spread, supervise valuation and the subsequent depopulation and disinfection of the site . . . ²