Significant savings have already had to be generated within DAERA during the current financial year and more costs will have to be taken out between now and the end of March 2024, the Department’s permanent secretary, Katrina Godfrey has said.
Addressing attendees at the British Veterinary Association (BVA) annual dinner in Belfast, Godfrey said the allocation made to DAERA by Secretary of State, Chris Heaton-Harris in April 2023, equates to a 1.5% cut to the Department’s core budget.
“In real terms it is a much more sizeable cut,” said Godfrey, who described the overall budgetary position as “really tough”, resulting in DAERA removing 450 vacancies, cutting posts and “not doing things we want to do”.
It also means “staff have not received the uplifts in pay they deserve,” she added.
Godfrey said the job of civil servants is to provide advice and clarity to ministers, not decision-making, so without local ministers in place, it is not possible to take forward various issues.
When combined with the tight budgetary situation it has created a scenario “probably more difficult than anything I have known in my career,” she maintained.
Within the veterinary service, DAERA is continuing to roll-out the new TB eradication strategy “as far as we can”, but some difficult decisions have had to be made, including around the continued use of the gamma interferon (blood) test.
She also acknowledged the Department was struggling to recruit enough vets (given the shortage across the industry), but said the issue is now a priority area within the wider civil service.
Medicine supply
Also speaking at the event, BVA president Anna Judson reminded attendees that a permanent solution must be found to the issue of post-Brexit vet medicine supply to NI.
In December 2022, the EU and UK agreed to a three-year grace period, allowing companies to continue to source vet products from Britain.
Best estimates suggest 51% vet medicines (1,700 different products) are potentially at risk, including important vaccines for leptospirosis and salmonella.
“We believe the issue could be resolved with the introduction of a ‘grandfather rule’, which would allow for the continued supply of vet medicines that were aligned with EU regulations pre-Brexit,” suggested Judson.
Under that solution, only newly licensed products would have to adhere fully to EU rules.
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Significant savings have already had to be generated within DAERA during the current financial year and more costs will have to be taken out between now and the end of March 2024, the Department’s permanent secretary, Katrina Godfrey has said.
Addressing attendees at the British Veterinary Association (BVA) annual dinner in Belfast, Godfrey said the allocation made to DAERA by Secretary of State, Chris Heaton-Harris in April 2023, equates to a 1.5% cut to the Department’s core budget.
“In real terms it is a much more sizeable cut,” said Godfrey, who described the overall budgetary position as “really tough”, resulting in DAERA removing 450 vacancies, cutting posts and “not doing things we want to do”.
It also means “staff have not received the uplifts in pay they deserve,” she added.
Godfrey said the job of civil servants is to provide advice and clarity to ministers, not decision-making, so without local ministers in place, it is not possible to take forward various issues.
When combined with the tight budgetary situation it has created a scenario “probably more difficult than anything I have known in my career,” she maintained.
Within the veterinary service, DAERA is continuing to roll-out the new TB eradication strategy “as far as we can”, but some difficult decisions have had to be made, including around the continued use of the gamma interferon (blood) test.
She also acknowledged the Department was struggling to recruit enough vets (given the shortage across the industry), but said the issue is now a priority area within the wider civil service.
Medicine supply
Also speaking at the event, BVA president Anna Judson reminded attendees that a permanent solution must be found to the issue of post-Brexit vet medicine supply to NI.
In December 2022, the EU and UK agreed to a three-year grace period, allowing companies to continue to source vet products from Britain.
Best estimates suggest 51% vet medicines (1,700 different products) are potentially at risk, including important vaccines for leptospirosis and salmonella.
“We believe the issue could be resolved with the introduction of a ‘grandfather rule’, which would allow for the continued supply of vet medicines that were aligned with EU regulations pre-Brexit,” suggested Judson.
Under that solution, only newly licensed products would have to adhere fully to EU rules.
Read more
NI abattoirs face five-day shutdown
Ballymena vets drop farm animal work
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