Government must recognise Pirbright failures and compensate farmers

12.00.00am GMT Mon 20th Oct 2008

Commenting on reports that the two laboratories at the centre of last year's foot-and-mouth outbreak and the Government are to be sued for damages by 14 farmers, Liberal Democrat Rural Affairs Spokesperson, Tim Farron said:

"It is outrageous that hard-working farmers should have to go all the way to the High Court to get full compensation when the Government has clearly been negligent.

"It is incredible that the Government is happy to bail out bankers, but won't accept responsibility for its own lack of bio-security which was directly responsible for destroying many farmers' livelihoods.

"The Government should recognise its own failures at the Pirbright laboratory in Surrey, and fully compensate all the farmers who suffered such terrible losses."