Sheep ID

Speech by Jim Hume MSP on Wed 27th May 2009

Deputy Presiding Officer, I like other MSPs claim an interest in Sheep farming and as a past Director Of NFU Scotland.

I congratulate Liam McArthur on securing this important debate at a time that we now need action.

Sheep farming has a long history in Scotland, none more so than in the South of Scotland where famous flock names such as the Cheviots came from and where the expertise of husbandry grew. That expertise taken into the Highlands and Galloway when they had their clearances and also exported around the world to New Zealand, where you will find many Scots named farms and farmers. And of course our premium textiles industry grew up with the Sheep industry, no coincidence that Tweed is so named.

But now we are facing a new clearances, SAC RSE and NFUS have all recently printed alarming declines in the Sheep stock of Scotland, and that directly correlates to active farming in the hills, so we are losing sheep and working people off the hills. 25% less sheep than 10 years ago and still falling, even with a recent long awaited rise in the prices, due to a falling value of the pound.

So the last thing that we need is any more unnecessary burdens to further that decline, re the recent pilot project referred to in Liam McArthur's Motion, it was found, what we practitioners knew before - three issues - Expensive - needless time taking and poor for animal welfare.

• the various electronic readers and tags need to be bought - and none of that expense will be paid for by retail buyers, nor this Govt., its all to come out of the industry, fine when the moneys there but disastrous when its not.

--- it takes time to insert the tags properly and that's no easy job- especially in a cold wet morning, I know that sheep don't keep their heads still normally, think how impractical that is when a Shepherd has 1500 ewes and a similar amount of lambs to tag, by him or herself - in fact its near impossible. There isn't the spare staff or time on farms to implement electronic sheep ID and of course our flock numbers are larger and more numerous than most of our European neighbours as mentioned by Liam, therefore Sheep EID is an additional pressure on farmers to decrease their sheep numbers and the knock on effect that has on our rural communities and related industries is only negative. And of course the concerns for fines if the systems fail - undue pressure on hard pressed communities.

--- and what of the welfare, necrosis in a sheep's ear is not a pretty site, most unpleasant for the animal who will get pestered by flies and mackit, not a problem in the Islands perhaps, --- never mind the impracticalness of Yellowsis affected sheep and torn ears in hedges.

All of these issues are important, but of course the main problem with sheep EID is that it is totally unnecessary, we have in place a system that works,- so If it ain't broke - why fix it. Think of the madness that if this system is introduced a Hill Sheep will have to be electronically tagged, will go nowhere off the hills in its working life, if it still has its microchip and its still working then it wont be read until 6 years after tagging. Far better that they are just tagged when leaving their holding, a practice that works and is totally auditable.

So we do desperately need a derogation now, our own Liberal democrat Minister succeeded in achieving this back in 2004, with double tagging and EID, it is now Mr Lochhead's responsibility to achieve what has been done before.

Article 68, as proposed by the Govt would split ths agriculture industry, not achieving a derogation regarding Electronic Sheep ID would decimate the Sheep Industry, one of Scotlands oldest.

I welcome Liam McArthur's Motion highlighting this important issue.