A vet who left the Department of Agriculture and Environment in Northern Ireland has received a 1.25 million settlement and apology after a successful constructive dismissal claim.
Dr Tamara Bronckaers raised concerns about animal welfare and problems in the meat supply chain when she worked for the government, but her warnings were not acted upon.
She had worked for DAERA for 19 years and was regarded as an expert on livestock market legislation. Her responsibilities included livestock markets, biosecurity and monitoring diseases that can move between animals and humans.
She resigned in April 2018 after she felt “excluded, ignored and undermined” for bringing issues to the department’s attention. Her concerns included how cattle movements were recorded at markets.
An industrial tribunal in September 2021 found that she had been constructively dismissed.
At the tribunal, she told how “animal welfare was a major concern to me and I witnessed first-hand animals suffering unnecessarily”. She’d noted how in one market, lame sheep and cattle or animals were left overnight without food or water.
Another issue raised was the practice of “deleted moves”, where dealers would take cattle out of the market for a time before a buyer was found, meaning they would be deleted from the tracing system. While this can make cattle more valuable to a buyer, it creates a potential concern regarding the traceability of meat.
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