Clause 2 - ''Protected animal''
Animal Welfare Bill
11:15 am
Bill Wiggin (Shadow Minister (Agriculture & Fisheries), Environment, Food & Rural Affairs; Leominster, Conservative)
This amendment has been suggested by some people and it is designed to avoid the application of offences under the Bill to animals that live in a wild state, but that are also of a kind that can be domesticated in Britain.
As the Bill is drafted, it is not clear whether such animals will be covered. A strong case can be made for their exclusion from the Bill because they can present a danger to human health that must be prevented. For example, a restaurant owner might wish to use rodenticides to prevent rats from entering the restaurant and endangering human health. However, because rats can be domesticated, the restaurant owner could be accused of committing an offence under clause 4(1), which would seem unreasonable given the circumstances of his actions. The amendment would clarify the situation because it marries the provision that an animal is not living ''in a wild state'', with the provision that it is
''under the control of man''.
Moreover, the amendment would ensure that animals that live wild, despite their possible domestication, remain outside the scope of the Bill. I suspect that the amendment very much does what the Government want it to do, and I hope that my drafting is sufficient to ensure that they take it very seriously.
Amendment No. 106 seeks to clarify the expression ''temporary basis'' in clause 2(b). It is simply not enough to expect the courts to interpret what constitutes a state of temporary basis without some guidance in the Bill. The amendment specifies the circumstances that can be defined in law as a temporary basis. That guidance would help the judiciary if the term was tested in the courts.
The amendment places an emphasis on both people, or on both parties in the case of groups or organisations, to consent mutually to the change in control of the protected animal. It also makes it explicit that when control of an animal is handed over to another person on a temporary basis, that person becomes legally responsible for that animal. That would ensure that, in the event of a prosecution, it would be clearer to the court who was in control and responsible for an animal, and animals could not be placed under the control of a person or party without their knowing.
Amendment No. 107 intends to clarify the meaning of ''wild state''. The Bill does not contain an interpretation section, so the courts will require guidance on what constitutes a wild state. Consequently, legal problems could arise when conservationists or gamekeepers release animals back into their natural habitats, or when wild caught animals are caught in snares.
We do not want people who rear endangered species to be prosecuted for replenishing stocks of indigenous animals on the basis that, by releasing them, they are in effect violating their duty to ensure the welfare of the animal. Nor do we want gamekeepers to be prosecuted for releasing their game birds into the wild. When the Bill was first drafted, the EFRA Select Committee determined that gamekeepers should not continue to be responsible for taking reasonable steps to ensure the welfare of game birds once they have been released into the wild.
The amendment also makes it clear that animals released into the wild must be released into an indigenous local habitat. In doing so, it would prevent keepers of non-native animals from releasing them from their control into English and Welsh habitats. Furthermore, specifying the definition of ''wild state'' in the Bill would prevent future regulations from defining ''wild state'' differently and would ensure legal consistency.