Successful livestock rearing requires carefully regulated feeding. Giving farm animals bits of meat which may have come from their own species was far too haphazard and dangerous for most farmers. Pigswill is produced under licence from the Ministry of Agriculture by fewer than 100 farmers. The suspicion now is that some farmers did not follow these MAFF guidelines to the letter. Before the decision was taken late last week to postpone the election, Downing Street sources were briefing heavily against rogue sheep traders.
Farmers receive subsidies for rearing sheep on the basis of how many animals they own.
A loophole in the law has allowed them to transfer sheep around the country for 21 days after they are purchased. There is no such dispensation for pigs or cattle. There have been suggestions that farmers moved sheep in order to temporarily beef up their flocks to boost their eligibility for subsidy. It is believed that the widespread movement of sheep helped spread the disease quickly around the country before the first case was identified. Vaccination vs slaughter MAFF came very close to introducing vaccination during the 1967 outbreak.