Animal health, welfare and food safety review
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Food Standards Agency (FSA) are calling for evidence on how EU legislative powers affect animal health, welfare and food safety in the UK.
The Foreign Office is currently looking at how the EU's powers affect the UK in 32 areas of government, with its two-year "balance of EU competences" review. The call for evidence comes as part of this review.
Defra and the FRA have asked whether EU legislation on animal welfare provides the right balance between protecting public and animal health and the interests of UK businesses, and what impact future enlargement of the EU might have on animal health and welfare.
Other questions in their call for evidence include, "What evidence is there that EU action on animal health and welfare benefits or disadvantages the UK?" and "How might the UK benefit from the EU taking more or less action on animal health and welfare in future?".
The bodies' review scope will look at the balance of competences - defined as everything deriving from EU law that affects what happens in the UK - in animal health, animal welfare, food safety, feed safety, labelling and food quality and compositional standards.
Click here to view the call for evidence. Submissions must be given by February 28, 2013, and a summary of the evidence received will be published alongside a final report in summer 2013.
Veterinary practices are being urged to help owners safely dispose of any unused and expired pet medicines - not just antibiotics - during November's Animal Medicines Amnesty. 
