Clause 28 - Imprisonment or fine
Animal Welfare Bill
6:45 pm
James Paice (Shadow Minister (Agriculture & Rural Affairs), Environment, Food & Rural Affairs; South East Cambridgeshire, Conservative)
I shall speak briefly to support my hon. Friend’s amendments, especially the first one, to which he kindly referred in an intervention. The proposal is important to the public’s understanding of what we do in this place and of the meaning of legislation. Sentencing practice needs to be simple, clear and understandable.
Subsections (1), (2) and (4) contain puzzling discrepancies and the amendment would rectify the one in subsection (2). In all three subsections, the offence could lead to
“imprisonment for a term not exceeding 51 weeks”.
That is clear, and no one could dispute it. But most members of the public would expect the alternative penalty of a fine to be consistent, yet the fine is different for all three offences. If 51 weeks is the maximum period of imprisonment, the maximum fine should also be consistent for all three offences; otherwise they will lack credibility, and that is daft.
If an offence under clauses 8 and 11 or those subsections could lead to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale, or 51 weeks imprisonment, why is not that the case for an offence under clauses 4 to 7? If 51 weeks is the maximum term of imprisonment and magistrates decide instead to impose the maximum fine, they are constrained by different maximums. The ordinary member of the public trying to understand the criminal justice system, which is complicated enough, will wonder why, if there is consistency in the maximum term of imprisonment, there is no consistency in the maximum fine.