Clause 8 - Tests for registration: utility and least suffering
Hunting Bill
4:45 pm
Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire, Conservative)
The answer to the question made from a sedentary position by the hon. Gentleman is four. Those farmers have said that there is predation on calves. It is largely when they are being born. The foxes eat the calves as they are halfway out of the cow. If it is late at night, and the farmer is not present, there is a danger of predation on calves by foxes. I admit
that it is not a big danger. The main predation is on chickens, piglets and wild animals. I mention it because I thought that I was tripped up by the hon. Member for Worcester, but the evidence is that there is some predation on calves.
The same argument applies to mink. I hope that we will have a substantive debate on mink hunting later. Predation by mink on fish is significant. Anyone who knows anything about fishing knows that if there are a large number of mink present on the river, the number of fish is significantly smaller. There is heavy predation and the control of mink using dogs seems to be useful vermin control, which the Bill would not allow. The same applies in a variety of other ways. We believe the utility of vermin control ought to be allowed by the registrar. At the moment the Bill does not allow that. Our amendment would help in that direction.
We have talked about habitat protection under the guise of the preservation of the landscape. I will not expand further on that, but we believe that an important level of habitat protection is achieved by foxhunting. A number of rare breeds—butterflies, in particular—are allowed to breed on land that is preserved by the hunt. I will not detain the Committee unduly, but we have a substantial body of evidence that demonstrates habitat protection, particularly of some rare species, thanks to hunting. Some of my hon. Friends might want to expand on that point later.
Finally, I shall expand briefly on the avoidance or prevention of the spread of disease. We had an interesting discussion about mange earlier. The same would apply to rabies and a number of other diseases that are carried by foxes. Hunting with hounds to prevent the spread of disease is an important utility.
A group of 500 vets under the chairmanship of Professor Allen produced a document entitled ''The veterinary opinion on hunting with dogs'' last year and concluded:
''The importance of the selective element of hunting, already mentioned above, whereby the weak, the diseased and the injured are detected and killed cannot be emphasised too strongly. No other method of culling performs this function and were hunting to be banned the welfare implications for all hunted species would be profound. An unknown but large number of animals would be condemned to a lingering death through disease, injury, malnutrition and illegal poisoning.''
The fact that they have mange and other diseases is a matter of great concern. Hunting can be used to restrict that disease and to prevent its spread. We believe that it is a particularly important part of utility.
The next category under amendment No. 20 is the use of the utility test
''for the purposes of obtaining food for animal or human consumption.''
It is bizarre that, under the Bill, the purpose of obtaining food for consumption would be allowed under exemptions but not as part of the proof of utility. None the less, an important utility is provided, particularly by the use of lurchers. Lurcher clubs in their submission to DEFRA said:
''The working man has carried out lurcher work for many generations, sometimes for sport but more often for pest control. In all cases, a lurcher hunts quietly and quickly. A lurcher soon
becomes expert in despatching its quarry with very little damage, enabling species that are edible to be retrieved and eaten. We understand that a substantial part of private lurcher work which takes part throughout England''—
we have discussed that subject—
''is for the purpose of killing hares for the pot and a large amount of hare meat is eaten as a result.''
When the lurcher man approaches the registrar seeking to be allowed to use his dogs for the purpose of hunting hares, the fact that he tends to use that hare for food should be allowable as an important reason for doing so. The same applies in some parts of the country where there is coursing for rabbits. I suspect that it is a rather unexciting sport, but I believe that it occurs. The primary reason for turning lurchers on to rabbits is to catch them to eat them. Under the Bill, that would be allowed because it allows the use of dogs to catch rabbits without any reference to the registrar. The coursing of rabbits would continue because it comes under the provision of food for human consumption. We do not understand why that should be excluded from the list that the registrar is allowed to take into account when considering applications from hunts or individuals who want to hunt.
I have galloped round most of the additions that we seek to make to the list of utility reasons that the registrar may consider when an application is made to him. In terms of hunting with dogs, the Committee is not saying that it believes it to be the most cruel or the least cruel method. It is saying, with clarity, that stag hunting and hare coursing must be banned because they are obviously cruel; the Opposition do not accept that. Equally bizarrely, the Committee is saying that
rabbiting and ratting must obviously be allowed to continue, irrespective of what happens when they take place. That is all we are laying down with any clarity here. It is important that we should be ready to give to the registrar or a tribunal the reasons why it is useful to allow hunting with dogs to continue. We think that activities such as vermin control, the use of dogs to catch meat for the pot, sport and recreation, the provision of economic benefits to the local area and so on are important reasons for allowing hunting with dogs to be allowed to continue. At the very least, it is only right that the registrar should be the person who decides whether the reasons given have utility.
At the moment, the Bill prevents the registrar from coming to any view on the subject of, for example, the local economy and the prevention of the spread of disease. The registrar may not have a view on that. He may be told that the activity would prevent the spread of disease or that mange is rife in the area and dogs must be used to keep the mange back. He may be told that a large number of jobs depend on hunting or that habitat would be destroyed without it. However, he may not, under the Bill, pay any attention to the fact that he has been made aware of that. The amendment would allow the registrar to decide whether the activities have any utility under the added and widened definitions. It is only fair that the widest and most liberal definition should be given to the word ''utility'' as used in the Bill.
Debate adjourned.—[Mr. Ainger.]
Adjourned accordingly at five minutes to Five o'clock till Tuesday 21 January at five minutes to Nine o'clock.