Under the 2002 EU Slaughter Premium Scheme, animals were required to be eight months or over on the date of slaughter and recorded on the Department's Cattle Movement Monitoring System, i.e. fully registered, showing, inter alia, date of birth of each animal.
While the eleven animals in question were slaughtered on 15 August 2002, they were found at that time not to be recorded on the CMMS system and, therefore, were ineligible for the Slaughter Premium, as they did not fulfil the Scheme requirements.
Furthermore, a subsequent examination of the case revealed contemporaneous records showing four of the animals as being three months of age at time of slaughter; no ages were recorded for the other animals.