The Federation of Veterinarians of Europe (FVE) is warning its veterinarians not to sign export health certificate unless they can ensure animal welfare en route. A veterinarian could be held culpable legally if signing off on certificates to destinations in which there is poor animal welfare.

See document here.

In response to Senator Faruqi's request, The Auditor General is considering an audit of the live ex branch of the Dept of Ag.....

It can't come soon enough for VALE. In addition to all the previously identified issues (lack of knowledge or will to regulate plus or minus corruption - See Moss  and Lawler Enquiries), this branch is still covering up big time. FOI documents are no longer publicly available once released and are harder than ever to request. High Mortality Investigation reports get forgotten (see Voyage 66!) or perhaps dumped altogether (still no report for Voyage 63 after 3 years). The delay on Independent Observer reports is still very long and most of the summaries when available have been shown to be significantly sanitised. And as for the editing of high mortality reports...incomplete sentences, poor grammar, omission of basic information (eg port of departure).....well clearly this Dept is under-resourced or lacking in basic competencies.

Bring it on!

VALE have just updated our webpages for High Mortality Voyage Reports and Independent Observer Reports. High Mortality Voyage 63 still has no report after 3 years. Voyage 66 is now up (delayed due to operational oversight (!!) and then delayed by Awassi Express investigations). Still the usual round of no obvious cause for the short haul high mortality voyages.....well go figure....they have a stockperson and NOT a veterinarian. A 4 day stockman course is not quite the same as a 5 year veterinary degree.....or is it? According to the exporters (Voyage 76), "an experienced stockperson would provide greater health and welfare outcomes for the livestock”. One has to wonder why the shipboard veterinarians continue to defend an industry that so demeans veterinary qualifications.

See: http://www.vale.org.au/high-mortality-voyages.html
See: http://ww.vale.org.au/independent-observer-reports.html