The laws that force visitors to say Auf Wiedersehen, pet

THE fax was waiting on the Irish Times machine when I got back from Luxembourg late on Tuesday night. Two days of mad cows at the farm council. Now dogs and cats.

Let me make my position clear. I do not have pets, and no one who knows me would imagine me to be a fan of Pets Win Prizes. A dog has only to pass me for my eyes and skin to start itching. Even writing about the beasts brings on sneezes. But I'm a fair man, always willing to champion the underdog.

I was not altogether surprised to get Maurizio Cancelmo's fax. Shortly after the beef export ban was imposed in Britain, Le Monde reminded its readers that some British Eurosceptics had opposed the building of the Channel Tunnel because, they said, Europe's rabid dogs, to a mutt, would make their way through it into Britain.

Mr Cancelmo, an Italian environmentalist living in Brussels, this week asked the Petitions Committee of the European Parliament for support. His complaint is that Irish and British quarantine rules are an unnecessary, scientifically unjustifiable interference with the right of free movement of citizens. If, both countries are unwilling to change their laws, he is demanding that the parliament and Commission prosecute them.

He wants to bring his six cats to live with him in Co Wexford where he hopes to establish an ecological research centre. He believes the regulations are "medieval, anti European and against animal welfare". He does not want to put his cats "in a little cage prison" for 26 weeks, causing them "stress and maybe even death".

I should emphasise the description is not in accord with that given by a reliable source whose dog has just left "fit and well cared for" Ireland's only approved quarantine centre, Lissenhall, in Swords, Co Dublin. The same source did, however, complain that any prolonged quarantine is stressful to pets and expensive to their owners.

Mr Cancelmo is also furious about the cost - six months in quarantine at £891 a head will cost him about £4,900 for his six cats, not counting vet bills or special diets. Dogs are even dearer, ranging up to £1,431 each for the largest breeds. That, he says, is up to 50 times more than he would pay in Belgium for reliable inoculation or a blood test that could prove the cats are uninfected.

The battle being fought by Mr Cancelmo is also being waged by a British and Brussels based organisation, Passports for Pets (PFP). The group is campaigning for a "passport" system modelled on the Swedish one adopted two years ago. Under this system cats and dogs are individually identifiable either by implanted microchip or indelible tattoo and they receive official certificates testifying to their medical history. The Swedes, who now boast it is possible to bring pets to Sweden on holidays if they have their passports, say not a single case of rabies has been reported since the enforcement of the new rule.

Few deny the evidence that quarantine, particularly of long duration, is now unnecessary from a scientific point of view, and Commission sources say the disease could well be totally eradicated from the EU by the end of the year.

Even the British Commons Select Committee on Agriculture in 1994 endorsed moving to the Swedish system for all animals arriving from the EU and other substantially rabies free countries. It argued quarantine should be left in place for "non approved" countries and for animals that failed a blood test. The committee said the system was both "feasible and desirable" and would "emphatically" not represent any increase in the risk of rabies reaching Britain.

Ireland's rules are substantially the same as Britain's, although it was permissible until recently to keep pets at home if specially approved accommodation was built. The Department of Agriculture has now suspended the scheme because of suspected abuses and all pets now stay at Lissenhall. They put up some 80 cats and dogs a year.

Because of the common travel area with Britain, particularly the Border, no government will consider any changes in the regulations until Britain does so. (The same argument is used to justify our non participation in the Schengen accord on passport free travel by humans). The Department of Agriculture confirms the issue is not even on the agenda and it has no plans to raise the question with the British.

A new look at the system does, however, have some high level support. The former ambassador to the EU, Mr Paddy McKernan, now Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs, has only recently got his dog out of quarantine. He says it would make sense to take advantage of the latest advances in scientific testing although he acknowledges we have no choice but to accept common travel area obligations. Any move would have to come from Britain.

One disgruntled Irish resident of Brussels said bluntly: "With the British complaining that the export ban on their beef goes far beyond what is scientifically justifiable, surely now is the time to press the case for them to live up to their own arguments and scrap this unnecessary quarantine rule? The case is unanswerable."