Newly-released figures that reveal the Department of Agriculture handed down 60 TB testing suspensions to vets since 2022 should give cattle farmers confidence in the level of oversight applied to herd tests and the wider effort to eradicate TB, according to Minister for Agriculture Martin Heydon.

The suspensions were ordered on foot of Department inspections that uncovered testing issues that may include non-compliant siting, clipping, measuring, equipment and the recording of incorrect information.

A number of these suspensions were not the first time the vets in question had been ordered to cease TB testing by the Department and 2026 is on track to witness the highest level of suspensions seen over recent years.

“I think the very figures you outlined there should give farmers confidence in a robust system,” Minister Heydon told the Irish Farmers Journal at the Agricultural Science Association’s annual conference.

“You kind of asked what should farmers think of it. Farmers should realise from this that while they're tested every year - and I know what that is at home to have the annual herd test and all the stress that goes with that - so are the people who test them.”

The Minister insisted that there is oversight “across every arm of this chain” as he pointed to recent TB statistics that mark a reduction in reactor numbers and herd incidence as signs of progress made in curbing the disease since April’s release of a new TB action plan.

“Remember, a year and a half ago when I came into this job, TB figures were really, really concerning and it was a palpable sense among farmers that action needs to be taken.

“I think farmers can take great encouragement from the figures to know that there is a very high standard being expected of people who do the tests and we're holding farmers to a high level of standard here because we want to get on top of this disease and ultimately work towards its eradication.

“Everybody along the chain of that, from industry to the people who do the testing, has to step up to that.”

Minister Heydon also expressed confidence in the Veterinary Council of Ireland (VCI) on the issue, stating: “I do think VCI take[s] this seriously and will continue to do so.”

The VCI may decide whether vets found to have been incorrectly carrying out herd tests are fit to keep practising veterinary medicine.

However, vets’ non-compliances with TB testing procedures detected during Department inspections of herd tests are not routinely cross-reported to the council, which is the regulatory body that maintains the register.