Government laboratory slammed over last summer's £80m foot-and-mouth disease crisis

The chairman of the probe, Iain Anderson, described the animal health laboratories at Pirbright, from where the disease escaped into local livestock, as a "shabby and dilapidated" place where regulation and risk management were poor.

Dr Anderson, who led the inquiry into the 2001 outbreak, said there needed to be a clarity of ownership and responsibility for the site, which is shared by the Institute of Animal Health and private company Merial.

Pirbright: The report found there needed to be a clarity of ownership and responsibility for the site, which is shared by the Institute of Animal Health and private company Merial

While the funding and governance of the IAH was "muddled and ineffective" and the facilities at Pirbright fell short of international standards, the science that came out of it was first class and needed to be supported, he urged.

Launching his review into the 2007 outbreak, he called for the Institute of Animal Health to be turned into a new National Institute of Infection Disease to give higher priority to the area of animal health.

Livestock on eight farms in the Surrey area were infected with foot-and- mouth in August and September last year, probably due to live FMD virus being used to develop a vaccine leaking from faulty pipework and spreading from the site.

Dr Anderson pointed the finger at those responsible for the situation at Pirbright: the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) as the regulator, the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) and formerly the DTI, which are responsible for the site and funding, the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) as the funding body, the Governing Body and the management at the Institute of Animal Health (IAH).

He said the 2007 foot-and-mouth outbreak should never have happened.

"This virus should never have got out. Everything was wrong around Pirbright, the regulatory system was poor, the risk management was poor," he said.

A farmer disposes of dead cows on a farm in Surrey during last summer's foot and mouth disease outbreak

He said there were a number of people who had the opportunity to see what his report described as the "creeping degradation of standards at Pirbright, combined with a lowering of expectations in spite of the potential dangers".

Dr Anderson said the communications between Defra, IAH and Merial had been poor, and a secondary leak in November - which was contained - showed they were still inadequate.

And while his remit was to look at foot-and-mouth, which is only kept at Pirbright in the UK, he said he would not be surprised if problems existed at other high containment facilities.

But he said a number of lessons had been learned since the 2001 outbreak of foot-and-mouth.

He said the leadership shown in 2007 - from the Prime Minister down - could not have been in sharper contrast to the "dithering" and failure to make crisp, quick, sharp-edged decisions over the 2001 outbreak.

And until the second phase of the outbreak began - with a new case found just days after the country was declared free of the disease - the Government had the full backing of the industry.

"The decision that was made to call the outbreak over was based on appropriate and proper information and reflection of the epidemiology."

But he said: "With the benefit of hindsight this decision was wrong", adding that in the future a more conditional approach to declaring an outbreak over could be put in place.

And with around 250 people a day, and a maximum of 450, on the frontline of dealing with the eight cases in August and September, Dr Anderson raised concerns about what would happen in a larger-scale outbreak.

"We wonder whether the effort that was put on to the ground to deal with 2007 would be scaleable in the event of multiple clusters around the country," he said.

There was also a lack of data about the animals in the area and movements, a situation which had not improved from the large-scale outbreak in 2001, he said.

Dr Anderson said his proposed National Institute of Infectious Diseases should be given high priority to deal with animal disease and the rise of zoonotic diseases which can spread from animals to people.

He also called for an Independent Advisory Body to advise the Government in the area on which both the Chief Veterinary Officer and the Chief Medical Officer would sit.

He warned there was a growing risk to the country from globalisation and climate change - of which bluetongue was a feature.

"The Institute of Animal Health needs to be reconfigured and relaunched in a new framework, given increased priority to play a role going forward as an important defence for the years ahead."

He said funds should be channelled from a variety of sources ranging from Government to a formal link with one or more universities.