Schedule 3 - Hunting with dogs: prohibition

Part of Hunting Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 6:00 pm on 8 February 2001.

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Photo of Alan Beith Alan Beith Liberal Democrat, Berwick-upon-Tweed 6:00, 8 February 2001

My hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire made a very thoughtful speech about terrier work, which is an emotive issue. Terrier work makes some want to ban foxhunting, perhaps because they do not understand why it is used or because some of their knowledge of it is based on what happened before hunts regulated it more carefully. That in itself is cause for thought for those of us who do not believe in a ban on hunting but could be persuaded, particularly if it satisfied some fears, of a case for more external regulation of terrier work. It is a very important area and one that we ought to think about carefully.

Because of the extraordinary and absurd provision that the dog cannot be used below ground, amendments Nos. 118 and 125 are designed to deal with the difficulty of a gamekeeper, or even of an ordinary citizen, who uses a dog to deal with a pest control problem. The provision destroys all other exemptions—a list ranging from pest control to lions which have escaped from zoos—as every one of them is qualified by the ``not below ground'' limitation. The trouble is that it is places below ground to which animals go in precisely such circumstances. That is why it is important that we sort out the definition.

Where does a rat bolt to if a dog is chasing it? It finds somewhere sheltered and secure. It may find a cellar—and I have already given the example of the cellar of the demolished house as a place to which a rat has access. It may find a minedrift or a mineshaft. My constituency is riddled with old mineshafts and minedrifts, some dating back over hundreds of years. The rats know where they are, and they will shelter in them.

Amendment No. 125 deals with caves and potholes. Where is the goat that we discussed earlier likely to shelter? In a cave—we have caves in the Cheviots. A cave is below ground; there is ground above one's head when one stands in a cave. The goat may find its way into a pothole. Those are definitional problems; they are not the fundamental issues of the Bill. However, if we do not get them right, then yet again people could be liable for prosecution when going about legitimate and normal activities. I will happily give way to my hon. Friend, who I know is anxious to be helpful with this sort of thing.