Animal Welfare (Sentience) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Fookes and Lord Hamilton of Epsom

Report stage & Lords Hansard - part one
Monday 6th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hamilton of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I echo my noble friend Lord Robathan’s remarks. I think this a perfectly terrible Bill, and I would like to speak to Amendment 1. The noble Lord, Lord Trees, made the point that this Bill was Article 13 of the EU with bells on. He knows a lot more about this sort of legislation than I do. I hope that the Minister, when he comes to speak to this amendment, will explain why this Bill has to have bells on. Why could it not be just Article 13 of the withdrawal agreement? Why did we have to add things on to it? Many of us are disturbed at the propensity of our government machine—Whitehall departments—to always add things on to Bills and make them even more elaborate than they were originally intended to be.

The noble Lord, Lord Trees, also made the point that his amendment was about process. Process, as I see it, and certainly in the days when I was in government, was all to do with legislation. When a department produced legislation, if that legislation affected other departments, it was circulated through those departments for their comments on it before it was ever submitted to Parliament. I do not quite understand what this new committee is going to do in looking at legislation before it is actually submitted to Parliament, compared with what happened before. Presumably, if the question of animal welfare came up, it went to the Department of Agriculture and it went to the Animal Welfare Committee who looked at it and said whether it was within its remit and whether it approved of it. So what is this committee doing that the Animal Welfare Committee did not do before? Perhaps my noble friend could elucidate that when he comes to speak.

Generally, what we are doing is expanding the whole mass of quangos and we have to think about the Climate Change Committee. It always advertises itself as a committee that advises the Government but seems to have a complete mind of its own when it comes to climate change. It seems to be obsessed with CO₂ emissions. It never seems to champion or recognise what has actually been done in this country to reduce CO₂ emissions, and it does not seem to take any account of the collateral damage. I hope this committee is not going to be another one like that.

[Baroness Fookes (Con)]

My Lords, I profoundly disagree with the two previous speakers, and I have no wish to be associated with the views that they expressed.

To look at one particular detail, my understanding of the committee is that it will produce reports which will then come to Parliament, where we can all see them. That publicity seems to me an excellent way of dealing with things. Of course, the committee would not be instigating legislation; it would be an advisory body. It will be up to the government departments concerned whether they choose to accept its advice, but at least we will know what this committee is thinking.