Asked by: Mark Eastwood (Conservative - Dewsbury)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to prevent euthanisation of healthy dogs in (a) Dewsbury constituency and (b) the UK.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In 2021, we worked closely with the veterinary profession to provide greater assurance that alternatives to euthanasia are explored before a healthy dog is put down. Following these discussions, the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons agreed that vets should scan the microchip in these circumstances to check whether anyone else has an interest in the dog who might provide an alternative to euthanasia. This has been included in the guidance underpinning the Code of Professional Conduct. This applies to all veterinary surgeons practising in the United Kingdom.
Asked by: Mark Eastwood (Conservative - Dewsbury)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the impact of his Department's publication entitled Action Plan for Animal Welfare, published on 12 May 2021, on animal welfare in (a) Dewsbury, (b) West Yorkshire and (c) the UK.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government has an ambitious agenda for animal welfare and conservation reforms, which we continue to take forward during this Parliamentary session. We will continue to introduce and support legislative and non-legislative reforms where possible.
Since the publication of the Action Plan, we have delivered on key manifesto commitments: we have increased the penalties for those convicted of animal cruelty, passed the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Act 2022 and launched the Animal Sentience Committee. We have made cat microchipping compulsory and have announced the extension of the Ivory Act (2018) to cover five endangered species. In addition, we have provided for penalty notices to apply to animal welfare offences, introduced new police powers to tackle hare coursing, and banned glue traps.
We are pleased to have introduced the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Bill to deliver our manifesto commitment to end this trade. The Bill will ban the export of cattle, sheep, goats, pigs and horses for slaughter and fattening from Great Britain, stopping unnecessary stress, exhaustion and injury caused by exporting live animals.
In December 2023, the Government laid the Animal Welfare (Primate Licences) (England) Regulations 2023 in Parliament and published the summary of responses to its 2023 consultation on Licensing of specialist private primate keepers in England.
Defra maintains a close working relationship with the zoo sector, and we will continue to build upon this to identify non-legislative improvements. We aim to publish updated zoo standards early this year, which we have developed in collaboration with the sector and the Zoos Expert Committee, which raise standards and support enforcement.
Whilst no specific analysis has been undertaken for individual locations, policies regularly undergo evaluation or post implementation reviews to assess their effectiveness in meeting their animal welfare objectives.
Asked by: Mark Eastwood (Conservative - Dewsbury)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the impact of the Environment Act 2021 on the level of food recycling by local councils.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Simpler Recycling will significantly increase the tonnage of household and business municipal food waste collected for recycling or composting in England, contributing towards Net Zero. The impact assessment accompanying our 2021 consultation estimated that over two metric tonnes of additional food waste per annum would be separately collected by 2030 under our central scenario for these reforms. These figures are being revised for our Final Impact Assessment on Simpler Recycling which will be published in due course.