The Government is considering lifting a controversial restriction on livestock movement as it pledged to free farmers from the "shackles" of bureaucracy.

Farming Minister Jim Paice has asked the industry to “work up ideas” that could lead to the six-day standstill rule on farm-to-farm movement being removed.

Critics says the restriction was put in place following the foot-and-mouth outbreak in 2001, which ravaged the Westcountry, but is now largely redundant.

The promise came as the Environment Department (Defra) yesterday announced it is to adopt 159 out of more than 200 recommendations made in a review of farming regulation.

It will include reducing form-filling and sparing farms with proven environmental and animal welfare standards from inspections.

Farming Minister Jim Paice said: "The Government wants to help create the right conditions for businesses to thrive and remove unnecessary burdens which hold back UK economic growth.

"With rising global demand for food, farmers and their skills are in huge demand, which brings business opportunities."

The regulation task force was led by former Westcountry farming leader Richard Macdonald.

In his report last year, Mr Macdonald, former director general of the National Farmers' Union and county secretary in Devon, argued the economy would benefit by ending the burden of "over-complex implementation, unnecessary regulation and gold-plated legislation".

In response, Mr Paice said the Government is "fundamentally changing the way we work with the farming industry".

He went on: "This is a balance of trusting farmers' expertise and ability to do the right thing, and farmers demonstrating that they can fulfil their responsibilities on protecting the environment, and upholding animal welfare and food safety standards."

In the aftermath of the foot-and-mouth crisis, an animal disease strategy led to six-day movement standstills, which replaced the previous 21-day standstill.

The Macdonald report recommended relaxing the whole-farm six-day standstills for animals coming on to farms from shows and sales.

When new livestock arrive on a farm, the farmer is currently obliged to wait six days before moving these animals, or any other livestock on that farm, to another site.

This is to allow time for the signs of any disease to appear on any potentially infected animals to avoid it being spread further.

The Government is now saying farmers could potentially avoid triggering this six-day standstill rule with cattle, sheep and goats if they geographically separate newly-arrived livestock from the rest of the farm and its animals by placing them in a distant field or building.

A Defra spokesman said: “This would have to be done alongside rigorous bio-security to deal with the new animals.

“We have given industry an opportunity to work up ideas on how this would work.”

The Government also pledged to lobby more on EU farming laws and hold a fly-tipping summit. Mr Paice said the moves would make the industry the first to benefit from the Government's pledge to slash red tape which hinders business.

Mr Macdonald said: “While some of the specific recommendations haven't been accepted, which will disappoint some, overall it vindicates everything we've been doing to drive forward change.”