NO matter how much scientific evidence backed Britain's bid for the EU to lift its worldwide ban on UK beef exports, the government cannot really be surprised by or carp at the flat refusal by our partners in Europe.

For it was simply too soon into the BSE scare to expect it to be killed off by an instant hey-presto announcement from Brussels that all's well again with beef - even though adequate health measures may now be in force.

And although, after running into this wall of opposition, agriculture minister Douglas Hogg's insistence on declaring Britain's dissatisfaction with the outcome may be made into a tasty morsel by UK Euro-sceptics, who currently have their tails up over the government's referendum pledge on the single currency issue, others here may be glad we are in Europe - when it comes to picking up the bill for dealing with the Mad Cow epidemic.

The EU is, after all, contributing 70 per cent of the cost of compensating farmers whose cattle must be destroyed instead of being sold into the food chain. And although Britain itself must pay for the actual destruction and the taxpayers may eventually have to find billions of pounds for that alone, the financial burden on the UK would have been truly horrendous without the aid from Brussels.

But, apart from that comfort, it is clear that the EU is determined not to make the mistakes that Britain has over BSE - which have so undermined confidence in the safety of beef.

The delay and dithering that characterised the government's handing of the Mad Cow problem before last month's announcement that there is a probable link between BSE and its human equivalent, CJD, has, as we see from an opinion poll today, been turned into suspicion in the public's mind that the government knew of the risk but tried to hide it. And that, says the survey, is what three-quarters of adults believe.

Thus, if Mr Hogg had come back from Brussels waving a piece of paper with the EU farm ministers' signatures on it, declaring that beef is as safe as he and the scientists insist, it would have been useless anyway, given the amount of distrust that the government's handling of this crisis has engendered already.

In view of that mood and the fears that go with it, Europe's agriculture ministers are clearly resolved that overt caution on their part is now necessary in the bid to restore consumer confidence. That tactic may be going beyond all that is scientifically necessary to cope with the disease, but it has much more of a ring of taking the public's concerns into account than had the UK government's apparent higher regard for the interests of the beef producers rather than those of the consumers.

Thus, we think, Britain will have to wait a good while before Europe feels it is safe to let it off the hook on which it has got itself.

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