The British Veterinary Association (BVA), the national representative organisation for veterinary surgeons in the UK, hosted its annual parliamentary briefing on Tuesday - an event attended by a cross-party selection of MPs.
The session highlighted a number of issues currently affecting animal health and welfare, including the highly topical government policies on bovine TB, and dangerous dogs, in addition to antimicrobial resistance.
Speaking the day before the government announced that two pilot badger culls will go ahead in 2012, a move endorsed by the BVA, the organisation's president, Carl Padgett, addressed the "thorny issue" of bovine TB.
With 25,000 cattle slaughtered in 2009 alone and bovine TB costing the UK taxpayer £63m that year, Padgett argued that the infectious disease was "one of the greatest issues affecting animal health and welfare in the UK".
Padgett outlined ways in which the government and veterinarians had attempted to eradicate bovine TB, notably the culling of badgers, which can spread TB to cattle, and vaccinations.
However, Padgett argued that there were a number of flaws with these methods. He said: "The main proposal that the government has been pursuing is controlled shooting. As a profession, we did make a very clear point that controlled shooting has not been proven to be the humane method of dispatching badgers or to deliver effectively to the same 70 per cent removal rate that the cage, trap and shooting did."
Padgett stated that vaccination is not "a panacea to TB control", and that whilst vaccination should play a vital role in any future bovine TB eradication policy, its current importance should not be overstated.
Following Padgett, Harvey Locke, the BVA's past-president, discussed dangerous dogs and microchipping.
Noting that the current legislation – the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 – had been "widely discredited", Locke urged parliamentarians to pursue a policy of "deed, not breed".
Under the current legislation, four types of 'dangerous' dogs are banned, but the British Veterinary Association, alongside 19 other organisations, are calling for dogs to be seized dependent on the actions that they carry out, rather than their specific breed.
Locke said: "Many innocent dogs are seized merely because of their breed. Breed-specific legislation is difficult and expensive to implement, and by focusing on the dog's appearance it fails to respond to the dog's actions and its owners."
"Breed-specific legislation also engenders a false expectation that breeds that are not banned will not show aggression."
And Locke noted that following a 2010 consultation from the then Labour government, 71 per cent of respondents had said that breed-specific legislation should be repealed, whilst 84 per cent had said that all dogs should be microchipped and registered.
Also speaking at the briefing, attended by MPs including Liberal Democrats Dan Rogerson and Tessa Munt and James Gray and Laurence Robertson of the Conservative Party, was Peter Harlech Jones, president-elect of the BVA.
Harlech Jones, former head of the veterinary division of the European Medicines Agency, highlighted antibiotic resistance and the connection between resistance in both humans and animals.
He said: "There is evidence that when you use antimicrobials, resistance develops and if it is used in animals there is the potential for it to transfer to man. "
However, Harlech Jones argued that any steps to manage this resistance should be based on scientific evidence.
And he called on parliamentarians to support the veterinary profession in adopting a "rational approach" to managing resistance to antimicrobials.
He said: "The BVA calls on MPs to support efforts to promote responsible use of antimicrobials in veterinary livestock and resist a kneejerk reaction that would impose controls that won't solve the necessary problems."
"And please do support the veterinary profession's right to dispense and prescribe medicines, including antimicrobials, according to our judgement."
The British Veterinary Association parliamentary briefing took place on Tuesday 13th December in the House of Commons, hosted by Neil Parish MP.