THE WHOLE trouble with the BSE disaster is that, more than a decade since the disease was diagnosed, the public still does not know who to trust or believe over the safety of beef.

For agriculture and the meat industry have livelihoods and profits in mind when they say their piece.

The government, particularly the last one, was not trusted amid uncertainty over whose interests prevailed with it - those of the producers or consumers.

And confusing and changing advice from scientists has hardly helped to dispel public doubts.

Meantime, agriculture has been plunged into crisis, beef exports have been banned, tens of thousands of cattle have been slaughtered - many perhaps unnecessarily; and millions of pounds have been spent on compensating farmers.

And if there is any consensus at all, it is that the cause of BSE - though still not the proof of it - lies in the "unnatural" feeding of animal remains to cattle and that eating infected meat is linked with the new strain of the human brain disease, CJD, that has claimed 23 lives so far and may yet claim even more.

Finding the truth, pinning the blame and discovering whether politicians, agriculture and science reacted wisely or responsibly to the health threat posed by BSE is a task that has been long overdue - if only so that the public may finally know whether beef is safe or not.

And in announcing an independent investigation headed by the leading judge, Lord Justice Phillips, the government has done the right thing.

It has taken the issue out of the hands the public is not inclined to trust - those of the farmers, the politicians and the differing scientists - and passed it to the unbiased ones of a judicially-led, open inquiry

A firm answer may never be forthcoming.

But, nonetheless, the search to discover what went so wrong on our farms in the 1980s, and how competently the crisis was handled afterwards, must be undertaken so that vital lessons might be learned, however belatedly.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.