Schedule 3 - Hunting With Dogs: Prohibition
Hunting Bill
4:30 pm
Mr David Lidington (Aylesbury, Conservative)
The amendments deal with paragraph 2, which sets out the offence that would be committed by someone who knowingly permitted land belonging to him
``to be entered or used in the course of the commission of''
a primary offence, that of hunting a wild animal with a dog, as laid out in paragraph 1. As members of the Committee know, to understand paragraph 2, one has to look at it alongside paragraph 22, which attempts a definition of ``belonging'' in the context of the new offence outlined in paragraph 2.
The amendments address paragraph 2 in slightly different ways. Amendment No. 37 would remove it altogether. Amendment No. 33 would alter paragraph 22(a), so that the reference to land belonging to a person would apply, not as currently stated,
``if he—...
(a) owns an interest in it,''
but if he owns a ``controlling'' interest in that land.
Amendment No. 34 would also apply to paragraph 22. It would amend sub-paragraph (b), which states:
``For the purposes of this Schedule land belongs to a person if he—...
(b) manages or controls it.
Amendment No. 34 would alter the phrasing to refer to someone who ``directly'' manages or controls it.
I want to use the amendments to explore some of the reasoning behind the schedule and to probe how the Government see the new offence operating in practice.
My first question is why paragraph 2 is necessary. I am not a lawyer. [HON. MEMBERS: ``Hear, hear.''] That is the first cheer that I have had from Labour Members during our proceedings. The Minister seems to be slightly outnumbered in the lawyers' trade union today. In a previous Standing Committee on which I served, his hon. Friend the Minister of State, Home Office, the Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Clarke) took great pride in making it clear that he was not—and never had been in his entire career—a lawyer.
It may be that I have not understood a particular point; if so, the Minister will be able to advise me. However, my understanding is that, under common law, somebody who aids, abets, counsels or procures the commission of an offence is guilty of that offence as much as if he had been directly involved in its commission. If that understanding is correct, assisting somebody to commit the offence outlined in paragraph 1 might involve several things. It might involve keeping watch while somebody hunted wild mammals with dogs, or actively encouraging somebody to take part in hunting. It might include providing the means for hunting to take place, whether the means provided were dogs, vehicles or equipment; or—this is the key point in relation to this group of amendments—it could involve making land available for that purpose.
Why is paragraph 2 necessary? If common law principles already provide for somebody who assists an illegal hunt by allowing it to use his land, why is the additional offence necessary? Does paragraph 2 spread the net more widely than under common law? If not, what is the point of the paragraph? If its scope is wider than the common law offence, what is it about hunting that justifies such an approach? Why are the Government not content to rest on common law with regard to aiding, abetting and so on?
Amendments Nos. 33 and 34 try to define more tightly the description of land ownership in paragraph 22. The current definition is too vague. Under paragraph 22(a), an offence would be committed by somebody who owned an interest in land and allowed it to be used for hunting. To take an obvious example, if somebody were a minority shareholder in land, would that person be at risk of liability for a criminal offence if hunting took place on that land with the permission of one of the other owners? Is there an implicit obligation on the minority shareholder under paragraph 2 to take steps of some kind to prevent hunting?
What would happen in the case of a family farm, which might be divided, through inheritance, between several siblings, one of whom owned the majority of the interest and operated the farm on a day-to-day basis, but whose brothers or sisters also had a shareholding? The all-embracing nature of paragraph 22(a) would put those minority shareholders at risk if, for instance, they failed to telephone the police if they knew that their elder brother was inclined to allow hunting to take place across the land; or they failed to take active steps to prevent him from giving permission to the hunt; or they failed to stop the hunt entering the land. I put it to the Minister that the language in the schedule is insufficiently precise and that amendment No. 33 would allow liability to be established with much greater precision.
Much the same argument applies to amendment No. 34, under which the provision would apply to someone who ``directly'' managed or controlled land. That would avoid putting at risk of prosecution a person who might be held to have a legal responsibility for a piece of land that was used for hunting, but who was not involved directly in the land's management or its day-to-day use. If we are to create such offences, it is important that people know whether they are at risk of prosecution. They can then take whatever action the law requires to avoid that happening.