Clause 4 - Unnecessary suffering
Animal Welfare Bill
12:45 pm
Norman Baker (Shadow Secretary of State for the Environment, Environment, Food & Rural Affairs; Lewes, Liberal Democrat)
As a matter of record, people can institute a prosecution if they want to in any case. Whatever the legislation says, it does not affect the number of prosecutions; it is a question of whether the defence is there. I believe that the defence is there anyway without the word ''property'', which has all sorts of wider connotations.