Sustainable Fisheries

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Wednesday 4th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State made fisheries the poster child for the leave campaign, and a number of promises were made to the fishing industry and coastal communities about what Brexit would mean for them. So far, he has categorically failed to deliver, and there are fears that this White Paper is just more of the same. There is a huge gap between his vision and what he actually ends up delivering. Promises made about taking back control of waters during transition will not be delivered, despite what Ministers said right up to the point of their U-turn. This went against assurances the Secretary of State gave to this House and to coastal communities to take back absolute control of waters on day one, and he went on to assess his own performance as delivering a “sub-optimal outcome” for the fishing industry.

This White Paper is full of optimism for the negotiations, but the only deal so far agreed on fishing is that we will keep EU fishing policies during the transition period. We are not holding our breath that this will all go according to plan. Future customs arrangements will be key to the fishing industry, but given reports that the Secretary of State physically ripped up the Prime Minister’s preferred customs option, it is clear that the big decisions for the negotiations, including those on fishing, are a long way from being agreed. Some 70% of what we catch we export, and 80% of the fish we eat, we import. Why should the fishing industry believe his rhetoric today when fundamental questions on customs go unanswered? Trade and access are entirely separate issues according to the White Paper. So far, nothing about the EU’s negotiating position says this will work, so how realistic does he think this position is?

I welcome the commitment to be environmentally ambitious. In that case, will the Secretary of State support Labour’s proposals for national marine parks? I also welcome his commitment to collaboration with the devolved Administrations. What clarity can he give on the future fisheries workforce, including EU workers, who are so vital for the catching sector? Will every penny of European maritime and fisheries fund be replaced, and what is the mechanism for delivering that? Will the Treasury be taking a slice, as it plans to do for agricultural subsidies?

The White Paper talks warmly about the coastal communities fund, but a recent parliamentary question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch) revealed that only about 6% of the fund has been awarded to the fishing sector to date. If the Government really think fishing is the lifeblood of coastal communities, why are they not backing this up with the funding that the industry desperately needs? We do not have to wait until Brexit to give the small businesses that are the backbone of our fishing sector a better deal. The Secretary of State has powers today to adjust quotas and to help, especially, the under-10 metre fleet. So will he make a commitment today not to wait until Brexit to do the right thing and help those boats?

There is no point in catching more fish if it is going to rot at our border, awaiting export, trying to reach markets. Fishing communities such as those I represent need a fairer deal for the catching and processing sectors, which are the backbone of our local economies and which drive economic regeneration in our coastal towns. If the Secretary of State thinks he can avoid scrutiny on the promises made to the fishing sector in the past, he is sadly mistaken. Warm soundbites do not reassure coastal communities. I assure the Secretary of State that Labour will be holding his feet to the fire to ensure that the promises that he makes today are delivered.

[Michael Gove]

I thank the hon. Lady for her generous welcome of so much of the White Paper. I thank her, too, for reflecting on its optimistic tone, which reflects the sunny disposition that is always there in DEFRA Ministers’ statements.

The hon. Lady asked what we have already achieved. Not only have we already achieved withdrawal from the London fisheries convention, but we have made it clear, as has the European Union, that although we of course will have a transition process, in the December 2020 Council—that is, even before the transition process ends—the UK will be treated as an independent coastal state and will negotiate as a third country. The European Union acknowledges that we will be leaving and negotiating separately at that point, and that is something that the whole House, and certainly the Opposition, can welcome.

The hon. Lady referred to the fact that 70% of the fish that we catch is exported, and of course it is, because, as I mentioned in my statement, it is high-quality fish caught by the brave men and women who go to sea. We will of course ensure through our future economic partnership, which is being negotiated separately, that we continue to have as-frictionless-as-possible access to European markets. Michel Barnier, someone whom I hugely admire, has himself pointed out that he wants to ensure that the free trade agreement that is concluded between the UK and the EU has neither quotas nor tariffs, so we can look forward to a bright future there, as well.

The hon. Lady mentioned national marine parks. That sounds like a great idea, but while Labour has been talking in the abstract about national marine parks, the Government have been getting on with the hard work of designating and protecting new marine protected areas around our coastline. The Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) has built on the work of my right hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) to show how a Government who are absolutely committed to instituting appropriate protection for our coastline can make a real difference.

The hon. Lady was quite right to mention the under-10 metre fleet. As I mentioned in my statement and as is made clear in the White Paper, we want to ensure that new fishing opportunities are allocated in a way that supports that fleet, but, again following the steps undertaken by my right hon. Friend the Member for Newbury when he was Fisheries Minister, quota has already been reallocated to support the under-10 metre fleet.

I wish to make one final point, which I suspect I may make a couple of times this afternoon. These opportunities arise as a result of our departure from the common fisheries policy. When an opportunity was given to vote for absence and departure from the common fisheries policy in the European Parliament, Labour Members of the European Parliament voted against it. It is all very well to will the end, but unless someone supports the means, which Labour has not done, they are not a true friend of our fishermen.

Ivory Bill

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 4th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

New clause 2—Report on the international ivory market—

“(1) Within 12 months of section 1 of this Act coming into force, the Secretary of State must publish and lay before each House of Parliament a report on the international ivory market.

(2) The report must as far as practicable analyse the impact of this Act on the demand for ivory in the United Kingdom and in other countries.

(3) The report must consider—

(a) the impact on nations or communities that generate income from ivory of—

(i) the provisions of this Act, and

(ii) international agreements related to the ivory trade,

(b) the work of the Department for International Development in—

(i) reducing the global demand for ivory, and

(ii) mitigating any negative impact of the provisions of this Act on nations or communities that generate an income from ivory.”

This new clause would require a report to be laid before each House of Parliament on the international ivory market, including how the Department for International Development is working to reduce global demand for ivory.

Government amendments 1 to 4.

[Sue Hayman]

I rise to speak to new clauses 1 and 2 in my name and in those of my right hon. and hon. Friends. Labour’s new clause 1 seeks to expand the definition of ivory to cover the species included in the convention on international trade in endangered species. Members from both sides of the House have voiced their support for the principle of extending the Bill beyond elephants. This is, after all, the Ivory Bill, not merely the elephant ivory Bill. It is not every day that an Ivory Bill comes around, so who knows when this House will have a similar opportunity to take action? Today provides a unique opportunity to enshrine protections for all ivory-bearing species, particularly those listed under CITES, which are some of those most at risk.

This broadening of the definition of ivory is not just because many CITES species are at risk of becoming endangered, but to stop the focus on banning just elephant ivory and so pushing poachers towards other forms of ivory, including hippo, narwhal, killer whale, sperm whale and walrus ivory. As the Born Free Foundation has stated:

“It would be a tragedy if we worked really hard to save elephants and other species were collateral damage in the process… We recognise that the trade is entrepreneurial and will move to wherever there is an opportunity.”

Both the International Fund for Animal Welfare and the Born Free Foundation stated in their evidence to Members that an extension of the definition of ivory would be welcome, provided that it did not delay the passage of the Bill. During the evidence session, Will Travers of the Born Free Foundation said:

“From 2007 to 2016—just under a decade—78,000 hippos and hippo products were exported by CITES parties. Hong Kong imported 60 tonnes of hippo ivory between 2004 and 2014… Those are not insignificant by any measure—they are enormously significant.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 5, Q2.]

As I have said on the record, the Opposition are keen for this legislation not to be unnecessarily delayed, but we must also ensure that it is the best it can possibly be. There appears to have been a rush to push it through at any cost before the international wildlife conference in October, despite the advice I have been given that this is not achievable: it will not get through all the legislative stages in time for the conference. Will the Minister clarify whether the target has been to get it in place before the conference? Will he explain to the House why the Government have sought to oppose sensible and necessary amendments to the Bill on the basis of not wishing to delay it?

[Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)]

In the spirit of consensus, will the hon. Lady also take this opportunity to congratulate this Government on being the first to legislate in this area?

[Sue Hayman]

As the right hon. Gentleman will hear, I shall be doing just that later in my speech. That is a very important point, and we do support the Bill.

Will the Minister look again at the arguments the Government made against Labour’s attempts to broaden the scope of the Bill in Committee? One of the arguments was that such an amendment could be challenged under the European convention on human rights. As I said in response in Committee, this is clutching at straws, and it is directly in opposition to the legal advice that I have sought, so I want to put this argument to rest once and for all.

According to the legal advice I have taken, primary legislation can be challenged only on human rights and EU law grounds. I have been informed that in the case of human rights, the argument would have to rest on article 1 of protocol 1 on the peaceful enjoyment of property, which is also subject to a public interest caveat. On that basis, we can justify the inclusion of other creatures—such as on the grounds of endangerment —in the same way as elephants. This is the legal information and advice that I have received, and I wish to put it formally on the record.

In fact, it is arguable that the omission of other species makes the Government more susceptible to legal challenge, not less, as the Government have already recognised the need to protect other ivory-bearing species, but have chosen not to do that through this legislation. If Ministers are going to continue to push this argument, may I ask that a copy of the legal advice they have received is made available to Members in the House of Commons Library?

Despite the fact that the Opposition feel that these other ivory-bearing species could legally be incorporated in the Bill, if needed, we have, in the spirit in which this entire legislative process has been conducted, listened to the concerns set out by the Minister in Committee, and we have revised our original amendment into new clause 1, to address the concerns that the Government raised in Committee. New clause 1 would simply mandate the Government to introduce secondary legislation on other CITES ivory-bearing species within a 12-month timeframe. Given that the Government have said that they understand the merit of widening the scope of the measure to include other species, it should not be a problem for them to commit to doing so in the Bill. New clause 1 would allow a consultation if necessary, while at the same time ensuring that secondary legislation is introduced and that the issue cannot slip off the agenda indefinitely.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Hugo Swire]

New clause 2 has some merit, but it seems that it simply requires the Secretary of State to report within 12 months. It says nothing about an annual report on what the Government are doing to help to combat the trade and what targets have been achieved. Why have the Opposition alighted on a single one-off report?

[Sue Hayman]

The new clause was tabled after we looked at what has happened since China banned ivory in January. Everyone was very excited about that, and believed that it would have a swift impact on ivory poaching. The evidence before us shows that more than six months on, it has not had very much impact. Rather than sitting here being very pleased with ourselves for introducing an ivory Bill, which I am sure we will do, we need to make sure that what we produce is effective in the communities where ivory is being poached. The idea of having a report in 12 months was to see whether what we are doing is having more effect than the Chinese ban. If not, the Government would have an opportunity to review the legislation.

[Sir Hugo Swire]

Indeed, the logic of what the hon. Lady says is that these things take time to have an impact. A one-off report in 12 months might not truly reflect the changes that the Government’s legislation will have in, say, two to three years. An annualised report is something worth looking at.

[Sue Hayman]

If the right hon. Gentleman would like an annualised report and would like to discuss with the other place how that can be pursued after he has supported our proposal, I am sure that that is something that can be considered.

[Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) (Con)]

Of course there is merit in studying whether or not these measures work, but new clause 2 asks a very narrow question. Ivory is just one of many illegally traded products. There are all kinds of forestry products, as well as pangolins—1 million a year are traded. Rhino horns are traded to the detriment of that species. The ban is just one of many hundreds of initiatives that tackle the illegal wildlife trade. Why focus on one of hundreds of products, and one strand among hundreds of strands of work that we need to tackle the illegal wildlife trade? It seems reductionist, and probably not the best use of money or time.

[Sue Hayman]

In the same spirit, surely the hon. Gentleman would support new clause 1, which expands the scope of species that are covered. We could say that the Government have a narrow focus in looking only at elephants.

[Zac Goldsmith]

I look forward to hearing the Minister speak and to a commitment that the ban will extend to other species. My concern about new clause 1 is twofold. First, I am not a lawyer, but I share worries, based on what I have heard, that we might unsettle the Bill by making it susceptible to judicial challenge. Secondly, the new clause looks only at CITES species that bear ivory, but there are other species that bear ivory. The warthog would be decimated if it became the legal option for people who wanted ivory, and the mammoth is a concern. Yes, I know that the mammoth is extinct, but it has become an enormous source of laundered ivory. There is a legitimate mammoth trade, as the hon. Lady knows, and it is used as an excuse or opportunity for smugglers to trade elephant ivory under that cover. That is a clumsy way of putting it, but it is a loophole that has been exploited mercilessly. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister, when he makes the commitments that I am looking forward to, will make a commitment to extend the ban, subject to consultation, to all forms of ivory.

[Sue Hayman]

It is a shame that the hon. Gentleman did not serve on the Bill Committee, because he could have supported our amendment 12, which proposed much of what he has just said.

Looking at how we tackle the illegal trade effectively, hon. Members will agree that we need international co-operation, as I have said. In debate and in Committee, hon. Members have said that we need to look at how we work effectively with the Department for International Development in the communities where poaching takes place. Poverty and corruption drive the trade. We have seen in recent days a terrible example of that with the poaching of Bella, a 20-year-old white rhino with a young calf. Bella was dehorned in an effort to make her less of a target a week before she was shot dead by poachers at Kragga Kamma game park in the Eastern Cape. However, hunters sliced her face to extract the small amount of horn that remained. The grisly discovery of the mutilated carcase of a dehorned rhino, killed for less than one centimetre of horn stump, lying next to her calf underscores the depths of South Africa’s poaching problem. It also underscores the fact that poachers kill for very little ivory, which is why it is important to extend the scope of the Bill.

Will Travers, director of the Born Free Foundation, told the Bill Committee:

“In my view, there is a common linkage with our clear objectives in overseas development, which are to deal with poverty and to provide opportunity...If we are not investing in the protected areas where elephants and other species live, we are not doing a great service either to the species we wish to protect or to the people who live literally downstream from those protected areas.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 9, Q12.]

International leadership and commitment are needed from DEFRA. I sincerely hope that the Minister will agree to support new clause 2, which would make meaningful the commitment to international action on the illegal ivory trade.

Government amendments 3 and 4 bear an uncanny resemblance to amendment 12, which Labour tabled in Committee, as I mentioned. Labour does not seek to oppose the Government amendments, as it is proper and right that the Secretary of State should have the discretion to include additional species, whether they are CITES-listed or not, at a later date depending on the evidence at the time.

I would like to make clear the difference between Government amendments 3 and 4 and Labour’s new clause 1. They are entirely different and in no way contradict one another. Government amendments 3 and 4 seek to provide powers for the Secretary of State to add CITES and non-CITES listed species to the definition in future if the Secretary of State so wishes. The amendment does not compel or require the Government to do so and it does not specify a timeframe. It is therefore important that both Government amendments 3 and 4, as well as new clause 1, are adopted today to protect the most at risk CITES species as a priority within the next 12 months, as well as providing the Secretary of State with the discretionary powers to include species at an future time if necessary.

This House is united in its determination to clamp down on the ivory trade. Labour’s 2017 election manifesto made a clear commitment to a full ban on ivory sales, and I welcome the Bill today. It is an important step forward in protecting elephants and starting to tackle this appalling trade. The Committee stage was conducted in a spirit of working hard and being constructive together. I recommend both Labour’s new clauses and the Government amendments to the House. We need to close any loopholes in the Bill that might further endanger the walrus, narwhal, sperm whale, killer whale and hippo. I have tried hard to work constructively with the Minister. I ask that he take our concerns and our new clauses very seriously. I urge the whole House to support Labour’s new clauses 1 and 2 today.

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

It was a pleasure to serve with the hon. Member for Workington (Sue Hayman) and her colleagues and with my right hon. and hon. Friends on the important Bill Committee. It is great to see the Bill on Report. Since before the days of Hannibal, the elephant has been important, totemic and ritualistic in our psyche and in our history. We want to ensure that the elephant, and man’s relationship with that supremely powerful and totemic animal, has not just a present but a future.

From time to time, I toy with trying to win the lottery. If I did, one of the things I would do is take my children on safari in Africa to see, among other animals, elephants. My children are quite young, so I think to myself that I will do that in 10 or 12 years’ time when they are a bit older. I just hope that the elephants will still be there. That, of course, presupposes that I win the lottery. I fundamentally believe that the Bill will have an important role to play in helping to deter the trade, making it morally reprehensible to trade in ivory and to poach, and to act as a beacon of excellence for other countries to follow.

I do not particularly like to be tied into other agendas and the timetable of other agendas, but I have been entirely persuaded, in Committee and on Second Reading, by the comments and assurances given by my hon. Friend the Minister from the Dispatch Box about the importance of getting the Bill through cleanly and swiftly to ensure it hits the statute book at an appropriate time and in a form whereby it can be cited at the important conference in the autumn.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

As I said in the DEFRA announcement—I am pleased that my hon. Friend has given me the opportunity to underline this—the consultation would start on or as soon as practicable after Royal Assent. The commencement of the Bill will be around six months afterwards. Importantly, the consultation will take place at the point of or close to—as soon as practicable—Royal Assent. We will then move forward with the consultation and, assuming that the evidence shows that it is right to put forward the statutory instrument and include certain species that we have talked about, we can then move forward on a quicker timescale than has been set out—[Interruption.] From a sedentary position, I heard the hon. Member for Workington suggesting that we do it straightaway, which is a lovely thought and I understand her intention. However, the key thing that I am trying to stress is pace. Let us make sure that the Bill is compliant as well. I say gently to Opposition Members—I know that they are committed to pressing the new clause to a vote—that we want to make sure that the Bill is compliant, and given the focus and commitment that we have all given to the Bill, it is not right for there to be any risk, not just to the future of the delegated powers, but to the Bill as a whole by putting such provisions in it. That is what I ask Members to consider as we move to the vote.

We have already talked about new clause 1, but let me just add further weight to the arguments around it. It is clear that this new clause will place the Secretary of State under a duty to lay an instrument under the affirmative procedure within 12 months of clause 35 coming into force. It would extend the prohibition on dealing elephant ivory to ivory from CITES-listed species, so it does not go as far as the approach that the Government have set out.

As I said, the Government intend to consult on the extension of the ban and to conduct analysis of the impact that this may have on individuals and business. The new clause, however, presupposes or prejudges the outcome of that important work and would remove the opportunity for the public to provide evidence. It would oblige the Government to extend the prohibition to CITES species, even if the evidence does not support it. For some or all of the species listed in the new clause, that could mean that the regulations may not be compliant with the European convention on human rights and could be challenged on that basis. Given that explanation, I very much hope that in her concluding remarks the hon. Member for Workington will consider withdrawing her new clause.

During the debate, a number of other issues have been raised and I will turn briefly to some of them. The hon. Member for Redcar (Anna Turley) has made points about resources and cyber-security. I assure her that this is obviously a key area of focus and priority for the Government. The National Wildlife Crime Unit and Border Force do a fantastic job and we are committed to making sure that they have the resources to take this work forward. Of course, the Office for Product Safety and Standards, the regulator, will have additional resources, and working together with the enforcement agencies, will ensure that the ban is enforceable and is done so well.

The hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) made the point about plectrums. If they are made of mammoth and assuming that the ban extends to mammoths, they would be prohibited, but clearly, they can still be used. They can be passed on and bequeathed; they just cannot be sold commercially. He makes an excellent point about narwhals. We have exchanged correspondence and we encourage other nations to take such commitments seriously. I will gladly meet him separately to talk about Canada.

The hon. Member for Workington talked about the need for a report. We talked about this in Committee at great length. I understand why she wants a report, but the Government do not believe it to be their job to produce one, because other organisations can do so more independently, and of course there would be a cost involved as well. I therefore ask her not to press her new clause 2. With that, I thank hon. Members for their contributions on Report.

[Sue Hayman]

We have had an excellent debate this afternoon, and it is great that hon. Members right across the House have welcomed and supported this important Bill. I thank the Minister for our constructive discussions in Committee and today and warmly welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey), to her place.

I take issue with what some hon. Members have said about Government amendments 3 and 4 meaning that new clause 1 is not required. Our new clause would amend clause 35(1), whereas the Government amendments amend subsections (2) and (3), so they are not mutually exclusive. If we are to make the Bill as strong as it can be today and achieve as much as we can, I see no reason why the House cannot support both new clause 1 and the Government amendments. We would then today have the strongest Bill possible. I am a little disappointed, therefore, that the Government do not want to support the new clause.

[Robert Courts]

A Bill that is open to challenge is not a strong Bill. Is that not the fundamental problem with the hon. Lady’s argument?

[Sue Hayman]

I will come to that point, but I am aware that I only have a minute and half left.

Having made those comments, I strongly welcome the Minister’s commitment to seek to start a consultation process on widening the scope of the ban to other species if the House does not support the new clause today. The Opposition have pushed strongly for this right from the beginning, and I welcome the fact that he has listened to us. On the issue the hon. Member for Witney (Robert Courts) raised, I talked about the consultation in Committee, and I must again draw Members’ attention to the fact that I am an associate of the Consultation Institute. I have taken further advice from the institute, and it has reiterated that the consultation could be carried out both swiftly and efficiently as a supplementary consultation without giving rise to any issues of legal challenge. It is happy to support the Government in achieving a very solid consultation. None of us in the House wants to see any legal challenges to the Bill. If the Minister would like me to put him in touch with the institute—if he thinks that would help—I would be more than happy to do so. With that, I ask the House to support new clause 1.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sue Hayman]

I just want to reiterate that Labour is not opposing the Bill. We have sought to strengthen it in Committee and today, and I trust that the Minister and Conservative Members who served on the Bill Committee would agree that we have demonstrated out earnest desire and efforts to do so.

It is good that there is clear, widespread, cross-party recognition that this comprehensive ban on the sale of ivory is needed. I thank the Bill Committee Clerk, Gail Poulton, for her tireless work with Members, for supporting me and my team and for her expert guidance. I also thank all members of the Committee from both sides of the House, including the Minister, for participation in a good-natured and thorough debate throughout. In particular, I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire) and for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard), and my hon. Friend the Member for Redcar (Anna Turley), who is no longer in her place, but was wearing a marvellous elephant dress earlier. I thought I was doing well wearing ivory-coloured clothes, but there we are. I also thank my hon. Friends the Members for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) and for Blaydon (Liz Twist), and my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) for his introductions to Obi-Wan narwhal. I thank all those hon. Friends for their support, time and dedication over the last few weeks. I also thank all the different organisations that have given us their time and expertise.

I would go as far as to say that there has been agreement in principle from all parties in the House for the premise behind the vast majority of the Labour amendments in Committee. All we were doing was seeking to increase transparency, remove conflicts of interest and clarify the definitions in the Bill. I will just highlight a few key concerns that came up in Committee.

We discussed an annual register of items exempted for having artistic, cultural or historical value. This was strongly supported by conservation groups during the Committee’s evidence hearing, and it would ensure public confidence in the ivory ban and that any exemptions applied were fair. Despite not supporting our amendment, the Minister provided an assurance in Committee that steps would be taken to ensure the utmost transparency and public confidence. In time, it would be interesting to have more detail on those assurances. We also asked for assurances regarding the potential abuse of replacement certificates, as the Bill currently includes no limit on those. Again, it would be interesting to hear from the Minister more about how any potential abuse could be eliminated.

The Committee heard that the National Wildlife Crime Unit has only 12 members of staff to cover its whole area of operations, right across the UK, and that this number includes administrative staff as well as enforcement officers. This level was a cause for concern in Committee, given the expanded responsibilities of the unit under the Bill. The Minister mentioned the potential for this being dealt with in the autumn statement—I think that is actually the Budget now, but it moves so often—so we would be grateful if the Minister acknowledged that these concerns exist so that they can then be addressed at that point.

The Committee also heard how the internet plays a central role in the sale of ivory products. I would be grateful if the Minister outlined plans for proactively policing and monitoring this online activity and mentioned what kind of resources would be needed.

This Bill is a welcome step forward for the future of global elephant populations. I look forward to working with colleagues right across the House to ensure that we continue to do everything in our power to stamp out the global ivory trade and preserve these iconic animal species for generations to come.

[Mr Speaker]

A number of people still wish to speak, and we have 15 minutes remaining.

Pet Theft

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Monday 2nd July 2018 Westminster Hall

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sharma. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Mike Hill) on introducing this important debate. I thank the organisers of the petition and the 105,000 people who signed it. The parliamentary e-petition system is a fantastic way of connecting us with our constituents on the issues that are really important to us and of putting such issues on the agenda.

We are clearly a nation of animal lovers. I declare an interest, as the owner of a dog and a cat. Many hon. Members have shared their experience of their pets. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Hugh Gaffney) for his contribution. He said it is a real disgrace that so few stolen pets are ever reunited with their owners. The hon. Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) is clearly very knowledgeable about this issue and made a particularly powerful point about sentencing guidelines. My hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Fiona Onasanya) made some very important interventions, which added significantly to the debate. I was particularly pleased to hear the story the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Ross Thomson) told about how his dog, Poppy, reacts when he leaves to come down here—like other hon. Members, I could share similar stories. I congratulate him on his ten-minute rule Bill, and I wish him luck with it in the House tomorrow.

The hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant) talked about the huge impact that the loss of a much-loved pet can have on a family. The hon. Member for Clacton (Giles Watling) talked about the cruelty of pet theft, not just to the family who lost the pet but to the pet itself. It is important that we do not forget that. The hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow (Dr Cameron) works tirelessly on dog welfare in this House and made an important contribution.

As pet owners, we truly love our animals. Figures from Dogs Trust show that 99% of pet owners consider their animal to be part of the family—we all do. We have heard that the bond between an animal and its family is linked to the bond between a parent and their child, so it is clearly a terrible nightmare for a family if their dog or cat is stolen.

More than 60 dogs are stolen across England and Wales every single week. That is 60 families whose beloved pets are taken. Disgracefully, fewer than 5% of cases end in convictions. We do not want that situation to be allowed to continue. As Members of the House, it is our duty to try to do something about it.

Battersea Dogs & Cats Home told me that there is no single database of pet-related theft, so any information comes from freedom of information requests to individual police forces—the hon. Member for Dartford made that point clearly. Will the Minister tell us how we can tackle this problem if we do not know the scale of it? I understand the concerns raised about categorising pets in legislation designed to deal with property theft. As hon. Members said, it is important that we recognise in law that animals are sentient beings and not the equivalent of a laptop or a blender.

Tragically, on average, five dogs a day are stolen and then sold, bred or forced to fight. We have heard that the numbers are increasing; my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool gave us some clear figures and information about that. We have also heard that designer dogs such as cockapoos or French bulldogs sell for a high price, and that Staffordshire bull terriers are often stolen for dog fighting. It is thought that the lack of prosecution and the lenient punishments are contributing to this rise. Pet theft offenders receive community service orders or a fine more often than a custodial sentence—certainly not the seven years that could be handed out.

It is heartbreaking that so few pets are reunited with their owners. Some breeds are more likely to be stolen. Labrador thefts are up 42% year on year; as the owner of a beautiful chocolate labrador called Max, I find that horrifying. The thought of losing Max is dreadful. He is six, but one of the first things we did when we got him as a puppy was to insure him, because we were advised that he was at high risk of being stolen. That is a terrible thing to have to contemplate.

I appreciate what the Government have said about updating sentencing guidelines for theft offences to account for the emotional stress caused by pet theft, and I understand that the guidelines now recommend high penalties in such cases. As hon. Members have said today, however, we need to ensure that the proper sentences are given and that prosecutions are increased. We must catch as many perpetrators as possible to do our best to stamp out this appalling crime, which causes such terrible upset to families.

On microchipping, it is welcome that the Government now require all dogs to be microchipped and registered by the age of eight weeks. That does not solve the problem—we have heard that microchips can be dug out—but it has already had a positive impact.

[Bob Stewart]

Will the hon. Lady join me in asking the Minister whether we ought to look again at licensing dogs? That used to happen when I was a boy—when the world was black and white, of course.

[Sue Hayman]

I remember going with my mother to the post office to get a licence for our dalmatian—I was only a small child, obviously. We ought to look at anything that might help, so licensing clearly needs to be looked at; if it can help solve this crime, it is an important part of the picture.

The Labour party is committed to promoting the highest level of care for domestic animals. Recently, our animal welfare plan was out for consultation until the end of May, and it included a proposal to expand microchipping to cats, which at the moment do not have to be chipped. Is that something that the Government will consider seriously? Our manifesto also pledged an end to the third-party sale of puppies. Is that something the Government will consider to improve the welfare of dogs? We also proposed measures to tackle puppy smuggling, such as the introduction of a microchip database—databases were mentioned earlier in the debate—to record microchip numbers of animals entering and leaving the country and get a better idea of where dogs are. Will the Minister and the Government match that aspiration too?

Enforcement of our laws is carried out by our tireless police services. Is it not imperative that the police are properly funded so that they can act to enforce the law and catch the criminals who are cruelly stealing pets from their owners?

The petition and today’s excellent debate have raised really important issues across the board, giving us all a lot to think about in terms of what needs to be done. The Labour party manifesto, on which my colleagues and I were elected last year, stated:

“Domestic animals require stronger protection from cruelty.”

It also set out a

“vision…for the UK to lead the world with high animal welfare standards in the wild, in farming and for domestic animals.”

That is something we stand by today and, from the clear cross-party support in this debate, hon. Members right across the House would also back strengthening the law in this area. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

British Flora: Protection from Imported Diseases

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Wednesday 27th June 2018 Westminster Hall

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Henry. I congratulate the right hon. Member for East Devon (Sir Hugo Swire) on securing this debate. Biosecurity is a huge issue that does not often get its turn in the spotlight.

The right hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson), the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and the right hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) all made important points. I share their concerns about the problems we have with the many invasive species. In our village, we have had to deal with Japanese knotweed, and we have huge issues with Himalayan balsam. Until I was elected to this place, I had a personal mission against Himalayan balsam encroaching on to our land, which I have now handed over to my husband. Removing invasive species is a terribly difficult, time-consuming and costly exercise. There is then the dreadful problem of dealing with diseases such as ash dieback, which we have also discussed.

Biosecurity is terribly critical but perhaps does not get enough attention. It is also vital for our biosecurity that we retain access to EU markets. We have to make sure that the right resources and infrastructure are in place to handle the continued movement of animals and plants. We need our trade with the EU to continue to be as frictionless as possible. Most importantly, regulatory standards must not be compromised by Brexit. The right hon. Member for North Shropshire said that we need to trade in healthy plants and I could not agree with him more.

Prospect recently submitted evidence to an inquiry by the House of Lords EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee into biosecurity, recommending better training for plant health officers, an issue that has already been mentioned. We need to establish a viable training programme for new and established inspectors, plus joint training ventures with the Horticultural Trades Association and the Royal Horticultural Society. The evidence also recommends more long-term investment in agricultural and environmental science, as well as that Ministers should put together a plan to deliver future biosecurity collaboration with the EU post-Brexit.

There are significant worries that we may weaken biosecurity protection and open ourselves up to risks and threats through trade deals, unless we do everything we can to ensure that sufficient checks and resources are put in place to mitigate those risks. Brexit could mean the end of shared biosecurity information—such as that provided through the European rapid alert system for food and feed, and through the European Union notification system for plant health interceptions—for the intercepting of pests and diseases on imported goods.

We are at the end of a huge plant supply chain from other EU states. This could be significant for the future of British biosecurity. The current system of sharing intelligence of biosecurity threats within or bordering the EU must continue in some form. Given the volume of UK-EU trade, it is critical that we continue to collaborate. The cost of dealing with pests and pathogens once they are in the UK is significantly more expensive and much more challenging than preventing their introduction in the first place, as has been mentioned by right hon. and hon. Members. That shared expertise is vital to being able to plan and prepare for future challenges. Any loss of that integrated approach would pose a risk to UK biosecurity. Will the Minister commit to retaining the precautionary principle in implementing biosecurity legislation?

We need a closer relationship with EU standards post-Brexit, but that may not provide the protections we need in the future, because we will have to continue to update legislation and practices, to tackle any new challenges and threats as they emerge. We know that climate change is spreading pests and diseases to new locations, and new trade deals will require new supply-chain assurances and the expertise to manage those risks. New legislation also needs to be flexible enough to enable quicker reaction to new threats and to improve the move from pest eradication, to containment, to management.

Another problem is that we simply do not know how much plant material is imported from the EU every year, as it is not checked, so we do not have any idea what resources we will need to check it. Have any estimates been made of the volume of plant imports from the EU? If those imports are not checked properly, does the Minister agree that there will be risks for biosecurity?

The current assumption on checks is that they will have to happen at supermarket distribution centres, for example, because we do not have the capacity to do so at the points of entry. There is a risk that inspectors could be overwhelmed by the volume of additional inspections and therefore miss dangerous pests or diseases in other imports. To combat that, I understand that the Animal and Plant Health Agency is recruiting about 40 new inspectors and seven new mangers, which is excellent news, but it is hard to see how they can be trained in time. There has never been a requirement for training on this scale before. Will the Minister comment on that and let me know if the training is being done face to face or online, as there are clearly concerns about the issue?

Currently, non-EU imports are managed through an HMRC customs computer system. The volumes are relatively low and require advanced notice. Inspectors are asking whether that system is appropriate for EU imports and whether it could cope with additional volume. Does the Minister believe that the current HMRC plant import customs IT system will be able to deal with the imports from the EU? Has any assessment been made of that? Is a new system being designed? If so, on what basis and will it be ready in time?

I am aware that I have posed quite a number of questions to the Minister and I appreciate that he may not be able to answer them all today. If that is the case, I would be grateful if he would write to me with the answers.

Ivory Bill (Fifth sitting)

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Committee Debate: 5th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 19th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment 9, in clause 12, page 7, line 40, at end insert—

“(1A) For the purposes of subsection (1), a person facilitates a breach of the prohibition if he or she, whilst not directly engaged in the process of a sale, acts in such a way as to allow that sale, or other form of dealing, to occur.”

This amendment defines ‘facilitate’, which is not defined in the Bill, using the text from the Explanatory Notes to the Bill.

During the evidence sessions we discussed enforcement and implementation, and the potential for mis-selling and misleading behaviour. The exact definition of “facilitate” in the Bill was also discussed. The amendment is designed to clarify that. The explanatory notes give details on page 22. They state:

“This offence would apply to anyone who, whilst not directly engaged in the process of a sale, acted in such a way as to allow that sale, or other form of dealing, to occur. For instance, this could apply to the owners of an online sales forum if they were found not to have taken reasonable steps to ensure that an item was a) exempt from the ban, and b) had been registered as such. Further, anyone found to have advertised an item in order to facilitate a sale may be found to be in breach of this clause.”

We thought that it would be helpful to include the definition of “facilitate” in the Bill, and the form of words used in the amendment is based on the explanatory notes.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)]

I thank the hon. Lady for her careful consideration of the Bill and for this amendment, which seeks to define “facilitate” in the context of a sale of an item of ivory in breach of the prohibition on sales of ivory. I would like to reassure her, and the Committee more generally, that the amendment is not required. No definition for facilitating a breach of the prohibition was provided in the Bill, as the term “facilitate” shall have its natural meaning.

The amendment would also be misleading, as it refers solely to the sale of ivory, whereas the Bill is concerned with the broader concept of commercial dealing in ivory. The facilitation of the illegal purchase, hire or acquisition of ivory for valuable consideration—that is, bartering—is also prohibited. The wording used in the amendment is taken from the explanatory notes, as the hon. Lady set out, but those are intended to provide guidance and steer on the meaning of the Bill, not to prescribe provisions.

I share the hon. Lady’s intention that the Bill should be as clear as possible, but on this occasion I do not believe that the amendment is necessary. The current wording in the Bill is sufficient to define when an offence of breaching the prohibition through facilitation has been committed. Furthermore, the Bill’s explanatory notes are not intended to set a direction in the prohibition on dealing in ivory; they are there to assist the reader. With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for that point, and I understand her concerns. We all want to make sure that cyber-crime is cracked down on more generally, and specifically in the Bill. As I said to the hon. Member for Workington, the Bill as drafted will tackle the issue of facilitation, so we do not need a further definition. We will also debate later today the role of internet service providers, which is included in the Bill. We heard from non-governmental organisations that they are satisfied that there are strong measures in the Bill and that the ban will be strong. I assure the hon. Member for Blaydon that the provisions will tackle the concern that she rightly raises.

[Sue Hayman]

On the understanding that it is clear what “facilitate” means, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move amendment 10, in clause 12, page 8, line 1, leave out subsection (2).

This amendment would make the offences under section 12 strict liability offences. The defence of having taken all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence would remain, but the burden of proof would be shifted to the person on proving this, rather than on prosecutors proving the person knew the item was ivory.

I will spend a little longer on this amendment and go through the evidence from various witnesses. Chief Inspector Hubble raised serious concerns about her ability to prosecute if the Bill remains in its current form. She said:

“We also have some concerns that, as the Bill stands, we have to prove that it is ivory and that the person dealing in it knew, or ought to have known, that it was ivory. If you look on eBay at any given moment, you will find a number of items being offered for sale that are not labelled as ivory.”

The Minister might remember that in Committee we had a look at eBay, and it was extraordinary how many items were clearly being mis-sold. Chief Inspector Hubble continued:

“From an enforcement perspective, if someone is buying something that is not labelled as ivory, and they are selling it as something not labelled as ivory, how do I prove they knew it was ivory? With the Bill as it stands, that, for me, is a real concern from an enforcement perspective. The onus should be on them to prove that they did not know, not on me to prove that they did.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 35, Q59.]

I think that is very clear. There is no point in legislation if it cannot be enforced effectively.

Chief Inspector Hubble was then asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East whether adding a provision covering mis-labelling would help. Again, the chief inspector was clear that in order to prosecute under the terms of the Bill as drafted, enforcement officers would still have to prove that the seller

“knew it was ivory and that they had then mislabelled it, knowing that it was ivory.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 39, Q75.]

She then added:

“All the time that the burden of proof is on us to prove that they knew, that is difficult from an enforcement perspective. If the burden of proof was on them to prove that they did not know it was ivory, that would make enforcement much easier.”

Later she said:

“In general, we do not deal with the people who will apply for exemption certificates and who will register their items and apply for permits, because they are the responsible, law-abiding people. We deal with the ones who have a complete disregard for policy protocol legislation. We deal with the ones who are deceptive, who lie and who want to make money out of this. The burden of proof has to be manageable and has to be able to be enforced, otherwise it is not enforceable legislation.” ––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 39, Q76 and Q79.]

I am sure that none of us would want to pass legislation if the officers responsible for delivering it did not think that it was enforceable.

On Second Reading, the right hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson) raised concerns about the implications of the current burden of proof lying with the enforcement agencies. He said:

“The defence of ignorance in clause 12 is a real concern, particularly as it is well known that the illegal trade is fuelled by unscrupulous traders marketing ivory as a bone or as ivory sourced from other species, such as a mammoth.”

I know the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire is particularly concerned about that. The right hon. Member for North Shropshire continued:

“There should therefore be a basic sanction based on strict liability.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 104.]

When the ban on the sale of ivory is introduced, as I hope it will be shortly, if it is to have the outcomes that we all hope for, it will need to be vigorously enforced. As I said, it is no good introducing legislation unless we can enforce it vigorously. Deleting subsection (2) would shift the burden of proof and make enforcement more likely, and it would answer the request of enforcement officers.

[Anna Turley (Redcar) (Lab/Co-op)]

I want to reinforce what my hon. Friend has said. The evidence from the police was clear: the burden of proof is critical, particularly given how easily items are passed around on the internet. There is huge scope for people to plead ignorance.

We heard examples of ivory being called animal bone. I looked briefly at eBay during that evidence session and was shocked at the proliferation of objects listed as animal bone, when they are clearly ivory, even to my unknowing eye. It will be extremely difficult for the police to enforce this legislation. We also heard about their small teams and the cuts. The critical point is that we are making their lives more difficult. It is extremely serious when a chief inspector tells a Committee in evidence:

“The burden of proof has to be manageable and has to be able to be enforced, otherwise it is not enforceable legislation.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 39, Q79.]

We cannot in any circumstances pass legislation that is not enforceable. It is great to say that we will lead the world with our ban on ivory, forge our way ahead and set a great example. If it is not enforceable and the trade continues, we might as well pack up and go home. We know what we are here to do. If the evidence from the frontline is that the Bill is not enforceable, that is not acceptable. We have to push on that.

I would like clarification from the Minister on subsection (2), where it states

“if the person knows or suspects, or ought to know or suspect”.

Will he provide evidence of how someone “ought to know” and how that could be defined in legislation? It does not seem strong enough to me. Enforcement officers are clearly asking for a shifting of the burden of proof, and that is what is needed if we are to make the Bill remotely enforceable.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

As I have already described, enforcement agencies do such work all the time. They work through quite tricky situations where they have to work out the intent as well as the act itself: for example, the difference between murder and manslaughter. I am no lawyer, but there are differences in degrees. The key thing is that the Bill will push forward strict legislation. The NGOs were clear that the ban will be tough. The provisions in the Bill will enable people to be held to account. The enforcement agencies will be able to do that. As I have said, an element of proportionality and discretion is required, and that is true for the vast amount of law that enforcement agencies need to enforce.

To give another example, a person might have inherited an ornament thinking it was bone, as family members had always said that it was. The person then sells it without realising it is elephant ivory. It is difficult to say that they should have known. The enforcement agency will need to test that and work through it. Over time, it will be able to work out, through precedent and judgment, how appropriate it would be to use the range of enforcement measures that we will discuss line by line. Those measures are there to help work out proportionately how serious that particular crime is.

[Sue Hayman]

I have listened carefully to everything the Minister has said, and I thank the hon. Member for North Dorset for his suggestions, but the idea of little old ladies being imprisoned for finding things in their attics is a little beyond the point I was trying to make. The National Wildlife Crime Unit will be directly responsible for investigating, and for enforcing the legislation once it passes, so we should take seriously what the chief inspector said. To remind the Committee, she confirmed that the unit had only 12 members of staff, so it is pretty limited in what it can investigate. She said that if the convention on international trade in endangered species brings something to the unit, it can tie them up for several months. She also said:

“We deal with the ones who have a complete disregard for policy protocol legislation. We deal with the ones who are deceptive, who lie and who want to make money out of this.”

It is not about people who find things in their attics. She continued:

“The burden of proof has to be manageable and has to be able to be enforced”.––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 39, Q79.]

We need to take seriously what she is saying. The Minister said that enforcement services should be able to take a view about whether someone should have known, but Chief Inspector Hubble said that was difficult from an enforcement perspective.

Earlier in our proceedings, the Minister committed to a rigorous education programme. If we have an effective education programme, people should know to check for ivory. We need a law that is enforceable and will make a difference. Otherwise, what is the point?

Question put, That the amendment be made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sue Hayman]

First, I will make a few points on subsection (4)(a) to (c) on the sentencing guidelines. During the evidence sessions, we talked about the fact that the Bill is not just about enforcement; it is also a deterrent. We have the opportunity to introduce sentencing guidance for courts in the United Kingdom to make sure that magistrates and judges have proper information when hearing cases. We agreed that we need good sentencing guidance to ensure that appropriate sentences are given. I welcome the inclusion in the explanatory notes of a table setting out clear maximum penalties and the different sanctions, which are imprisonment or the statutory maximum fines. I may have misheard, but I thought the Minister said that there would be unlimited fines. Will he clarify that point?

Witnesses at the evidence sessions also stressed the need for significant awareness programmes to accompany the introduction of the Bill—I also mentioned that point during the discussion of amendment 10—not just for the judiciary, but for the general public. Education of the public, the judiciary and the enforcement officers is essential. Does the Minister have any further information about how his Department intends to roll out an education programme to inform the general public and the judiciary about exactly what is required and how the Bill is intended to work?

The witness from the International Fund for Animal Welfare said that he hoped that having consulted IFAW on the draft legislation, the Department would also be willing to consult it on the guidance notes. Has the Minister thought any more about that? Another witness, Alexander Rhodes from Stop Ivory, made an interesting and helpful suggestion about how we can learn from some of the African countries that are members of the Elephant Protection Initiative, which has been working hard to develop prosecution and sentencing guidelines for wildlife crime, particularly in relation to the ivory trade. During the evidence session, he said not only is this an area where we can learn from what African countries have been doing about the ivory trade, but our Government have paid for it anyway. He gave the example of Angola, where a challenge fund grant is paying to review a programme of legislative reform, and for prosecutor and judicial training. Has the Minister looked at how we can learn from that initiative? If good work is taking place in other parts of the world, it is important to learn from it to make the Bill as effective as possible. Will the Ministry of Justice or the Home Office be involved in developing the judicial guidelines?

New clause 3, as we heard from the Minister, is about the assessment of enforcement resources. We would require an assessment to be made and laid before Parliament on the level of resources allocated, or proposed to be allocated, to enforcement of the prohibition of ivory dealing. Clearly, unless we have effective enforcement, the Bill is toothless. Enforcement is a critical part of achieving the aims of the legislation. Chief Inspector Hubble stated that point succinctly during the evidence session, saying that

“any Bill has to be enforceable; if not, it is just guidance. It is not legislation if it cannot be enforced.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 35, Q59.]

None of us in Committee wants simply to produce guidance notes to guidance legislation.

During the progress of the Bill, Members in all parts of the House have raised the issue of resources necessary to enforce the Ivory Bill effectively. On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) said that

“the ban will be meaningful only if it is properly enforced”,

stressing the need for the provision of

“a long-term settlement for the National Wildlife Crime Unit, as well as resources for the CITES Border Force team.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 111.]

The right hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson) asked for

“a strong, firm reassurance from the Minister that this legislation will need enforcing and will need the right level of expertise.”

Enforcement is not just about funding, but about the level of expertise required. He said that the National Wildlife Crime Unit should

“be beefed up and properly resourced for the future. On the same grounds, the CITES Border Force team at Heathrow needs sufficient levels of manpower and resources, as they will be our front line of defence against illegal imports and organised criminal activity coming into the UK.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 105.]

I am aware that the witness from Border Force at Heathrow said that he had the resources necessary for enforcement at the moment, but clearly the Bill might have an impact on that. It is therefore important to understand the potential increase in workloads, including the possible impact on the ability to enforce properly.

On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire also mentioned the National Wildlife Crime Unit. She expressed her hope that

“that the Secretary of State will be able to announce permanent funding for the unit, as its existing funding expires in 2020.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 116.]

In the evidence session with the enforcement agencies, we heard how the Border Force CITES team and the NWCU work in partnership, and that the Border Force no longer has an investigation function but hands over all its intelligence from investigations to the NWCU, with a view to the unit investigating the offences. We heard from Chief Inspector Hubble exactly what that involves:

“We collate that intelligence, develop it and research it to look at the number of items that people might be buying, selling or trading. We look at their associates. We try to map a network of people that they are linked in with, and ultimately we produce an intelligence package that goes out to a police force in the area where the person is committing the offences.

We have four officers who provide an investigative function to support police forces on the ground, and they work with police officers throughout the investigation: taking statements from witnesses, linking in with experts, compiling prosecution files, assisting with search warrants, and attending court to provide evidence… One seizure by Border Force can result in months and months of investigation for us, and we can compile hundreds of intelligence logs from that one investigation. At the moment, we struggle to disseminate all that intelligence back out to Border Force, to close that loop, because we just do not have the resource to develop that. We have to be selective in what we deal with”.––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 34, Q57.]

I imagine that every single member of the Committee is impressed with the amount of work carried out by such a small team—only 12 in total. The team does not just carry out investigations referred from Border Force, but works right across all of the UK wildlife crime priority areas, which is a significant remit outside CITES, including domestic wildlife, bats, badgers, prosecutions relating to birds of prey, freshwater pearl mussels and poaching. All of those sit within the UK’s strategic priorities, and the work of the NWCU is split right across all those areas.

A strong commitment to future funding is vital if that important work is to continue. We have heard that the funding is committed to 2020, but beyond that, the NWCU has had no formal indication that there will be continued funding, which clearly causes concern. It is unable to plan or commit to long-term strategies. It is very difficult for any agency to form business plans when, in 20 months, it may well not exist at all.

Chief Inspector Hubble said about the morale of her staff:

“It is difficult for me to keep my staff motivated when they have no job security—a whole raft of concerns are caused by funding.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 37, Q67.]

She was also asked about the potential increase in the number of investigations once the Bill comes into force. She replied that

“if a member of the public sees something on sale that they think is ivory, inevitably they will report it, which comes back to the issue of resourcing and how we deal with the potential increase in the volume of crimes”.––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 44, Q93.]

Grant Miller, from the CITES Border Force team at Heathrow was asked about the future of the NWCU and the implications for enforcement if its funding were to be discontinued. His reply was clear:

“Our ability to take cases and offenders before the courts would be impacted on greatly. We would be pushed into going out to each constabulary, looking for a supportive senior manager to take on an investigation on our behalf. If we were not able to find that, our activity would be just to disrupt and seize, and the threat would just continue.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 40, Q82.]

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State said he would look to strengthen and resource specialised enforcement to combat illegal ivory dealing. Winding up the debate, the Minister agreed:

“The work carried out by the National Wildlife Crime Unit is absolutely critical.”

With regard to its funding, he assured me that the Government

“are looking at that vital issue ahead of the IWT conference, and I am sure that the Secretary of State would be working on it with the Home Secretary.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 133.]

In response to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh), the Secretary of State confirmed in that debate that

“in the run-up to the illegal wildlife trade summit this October we will be looking not just to ensure that we can continue to staff and support the officers who work in this field adequately, but to ensure that we go even further.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 98.]

Will the Minister give some more information on that commitment from the Secretary of State? When is the NWCU likely to hear about its future funding to support the delivery the Bill?

The Minister also confirmed that the Office for Product Safety and Standards will be the regulator. He spoke about that a moment ago, but will he elaborate on how the reporting requirements will work with the regulator? How does he see the regulator reducing the burden on the enforcement services, as he mentioned in his previous statement?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 13, in schedule 1, page 31, line 22, at end insert—

“(d) the circumstances in which the Secretary of State would consider criminal sanctions more appropriate than civil sanctions.”

This amendment requires the Secretary of State’s guidance under paragraph 21 to state in what circumstances criminal sanctions are considered more appropriate than civil sanctions.

That schedule 1 be the First schedule to the Bill.

[Sue Hayman]

Amendment 13 is pretty straightforward. It was designed to clarify the circumstances in which the Secretary of State will consider criminal sanctions to be more appropriate than civil sanctions. We propose to insert it into paragraph 21 of schedule 1 in order to be absolutely clear about why a criminal sanction would come into play, as opposed to a civil sanction. The Minister said that the bulk of cases will come under civil sanctions, but what is the tipping point? We feel that anyone involved in this will need to understand properly the circumstances in which the Secretary of State would consider a case to have tipped into a criminal sanction.

[David Rutley]

I set out in our discussion on clause 12 that a mixed regime of criminal and civil sanctions will be applied to the offences under the Bill. In line with that approach, clause 13 ensures that civil sanctions may be applied to breaches of the ban. The civil sanctions are detailed in schedule 1. We recognise that offences made under the Bill may vary in severity. Overly harsh sanctions should not be applied in a way that could be deemed to be disproportionate. For example, where members of the public have genuinely made every effort to abide by the ban or are genuinely of the belief that the item is not ivory, it would clearly be inappropriate to levy criminal sanctions.

However, compliance with the ban cannot be seen as optional. Acts of non-compliance must be deterred and penalised with the appropriate level of sanction. That is critical if we are to meet our objective of ending the link between the UK ivory market and elephant poaching. The clause ensures that, where a criminal sanction is unwarranted, a range of civil sanctions may be applied. The regulatory body and the police will be responsible for identifying and investigating breaches of the ban. The regulatory body will be responsible for issuing civil sanctions, as I described earlier.

If an offender does not comply with a civil sanction imposed against them—for example, if they do not pay the monetary penalty imposed against them within the necessary period—they may be subject to criminal sanctions. The Government believe that the range of available sanctions reflects the seriousness of the ban, while allowing it to be proportionate. I commend the clause to the Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

The amendment would interfere with the discretion given to enforcement and prosecution authorities as they consider the facts of each case to arrive at a decision as to whether criminal or civil sanctions would be more appropriate. I reassure the hon. Member for Workington that, given the wording of paragraph 21(1)(c) of schedule 1, sufficient information will be outlined in the guidance, which should aid the correct authorities to enforce the prohibition. With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for providing that detail. Schedule 1 states that the Secretary of State must

“prepare and publish guidance as to”—

this is in paragraph 21(1)(c)—

“the circumstances in which the Secretary of State is likely to take any such action.”

Does that clearly explain whether he would consider criminal sanctions to be more appropriate than civil questions? Perhaps further clarification could be given in the guidance that accompanies the Bill, because it is important for people to understand whether these are criminal or civil sanctions. Could the guidance be elaborated to make that clear?

[David Rutley]

I understand the hon. Lady’s concern about getting this right. I can assure her that there will be further clarification on these points in the guidance. The point is well made, but it will be in the guidance.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 13 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 1 agreed to.

Clause 14

Power to stop and search persons

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Clauses 18 and 19 stand part.

That schedule 2 be the Second schedule to the Bill.

[Sue Hayman]

The hon. Member for Cheltenham said during one of our evidence sessions that some people had raised concerns about the fact that accredited civilian officers at present have quite swingeing powers to enter premises, search, check and so on. He asked Anthony Browne, the chairman of the British Art Market Federation, whether he had any concerns about the scope and nature of those powers, and Mr Browne’s reply was that there were concerns and that he was very glad that the hon. Gentleman had raised the issue.

Mr Browne said that one of the federation’s members had been given legal advice—he said he was happy to make that available to the Committee, although I am not sure whether he has—that giving those powers to civilians was

“most unusual…if not unprecedented, except where public safety considerations are in prospect.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 49, Q105.]

I wonder whether Mr Browne has submitted that advice to the Minister. He did say that he had a memorandum that he was happy to submit for consideration. Has the Minister had any more thoughts on that? I thought that the hon. Member for Cheltenham made a very good point. He said that it is not entirely clear in the legislation who the accredited civilian officers would be, their qualifications and where they would be drawn from. I would be grateful if the Minister would clarify those points.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

The hon. Member for Workington has put it very well. I have nothing to add but, for obvious reasons, endorse the remarks she has made.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Of course, there will be a strong training regime to ensure that these individuals are able to carry out their current role and we want to ensure that they have adequate training to take on new roles related to the ivory prohibition. I will write to him with details of how that will be moved forward.

[Sue Hayman]

Further to that point, the situation has been described as possibly unprecedented. How often does the Minister see these civilian officers taking part in investigations? Would that be rare or a regular part of the enforcement process? That would clearly affect resources and training. I would be grateful for clarification on that.

[David Rutley]

The Bill is clear that the powers given to the body and its members will be strictly controlled. The relationship with customs officers and police officers is tightly defined. As for the number of times it will be used, we are putting more focus on civil sanctions. The key point is that officers or members of the OPSS will need these powers to carry out their work and move matters through. The hon. Lady will note that clause 17 requires the OPSS to issue reasonable notice of intent to enter. The move to enter premises is not just to search; it can also be to ensure compliance. It is important to remember that the job of the OPSS is to help educate and train as well as ensure compliance and enforcement. It is a matter of thinking about their role more broadly. In many situations, as set out in the Bill, reasonable notice will be required.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 17 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 18 and 19 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 2 agreed to.

Clauses 20 to 26 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

I reassure my hon. Friend that we are not looking to skimp, and we must of course ensure proper training. I will write to him, as I have already promised. We are all getting our heads around a new regime, but I assure the Committee that it is not unprecedented for OPSS to exercise powers under legislation; it falls under the remit of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and, as I have said, it has these powers already in relation to the Consumer Rights Act 2015. We want to ensure that it has the proper powers and that there is proper training, because of the implications.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 27 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 28 to 34 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 35

Meaning of “ivory”

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move amendment 11, in page 20, line 40, leave out “an elephant” and insert “a hippopotamus, elephant, killer whale, narwhal, sperm whale, or walrus.”

This amendment would include in the definition of ivory all the ivory-bearing species listed in an Appendix to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 12, in page 21, line 3, leave out from “subsection” to the end of line 5

This amendment would allow the Secretary of State to make regulations in the future that would include any ivory species, even if not listed in an appendix to CITES.

Clause stand part.

[Sue Hayman]

Amendment 11 would include under the definition of ivory all the ivory-bearing species listed in an appendix to CITES. We have discussed the definition of ivory at length at every stage of the Bill, so I want to consider some of the discussion that we have had.

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State said that there would be an opportunity in Committee to consider whether the scope of the Bill was absolutely as it should be. He said:

“A number of Members have previously indicated their interest in extending its scope to other forms of ivory, such as narwhal horns, and there will indeed be an opportunity to debate precisely that matter in Committee.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 92.]

With amendment 11, I am taking the Secretary of State up on that generous offer and considering it in more detail.

[David Rutley]

Very kind.

[Sue Hayman]

I know how the Minister appreciates it.

Several hon. Members, some of whom are members of the Committee and others who are not but took part in the Second Reading debate, have spoken about why they feel it is really important that we look at extending the Bill’s scope. They include my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East, who I believe is paired today, the hon. Members for Mid Derbyshire and for North Dorset, who are both here today, the right hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson), and the hon. Members for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith), for North East Hampshire (Mr Jayawardena), for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mrs Trevelyan), for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), for Witney, and for Southend West (Sir David Amess). They all raised the specific issue of extending the scope on Second Reading.

[Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

Although I agree that we need to look at going beyond elephant ivory at some point, we need to get this Bill through quickly, even though it is narrow. I would have preferred it to be wider, but it cannot be because we have not consulted on that. Does the hon. Lady agree that it would be better to get the Bill through and to widen the scope at a later stage, as soon as we possibly can, rather than delay its implementation as it stands?

[Sue Hayman]

I agree that we need to get the Bill through very quickly, because of its important purpose. However, on consultation, I have taken professional advice from the Consultation Institute, and I declare an interest because I am an associate. Its advice to me, as a professional organisation that works with different Departments, is that consultation will not necessarily delay the Bill and prevent it from being ready before the conference that we are all looking forward to in October.

The Consultation Institute does not believe that it is illegal to move forward without further consultation, but if consultation was necessary, the Government could easily devise a quick consultation of no more than 14 days, by going back to the organisations that have already shown an interest in this matter through responding to the initial consultation. That could be done very quickly; there is no reason to delay the Bill by extending that consultation. The institute would be happy to work with the Department and endorse that consultation formally at the end, so that there would be no challenge. The Government have apparently done short consultations in the past as top-up consultations to something that has already taken place, as a piece of legislation goes through.

[Anna Turley]

I appreciate the helpful explanation of the consultation process, and I completely agree with my hon. Friend. I am quite confused about the point that has been pressed a number of times, that widening the scope slightly to include other animals would delay the Bill’s progress. The Opposition have tabled an amendment, which is being discussed. If we were in a world where we did not amend Bills during a parliamentary process because we had not consulted on the relevant issue from the exact outset, goodness me, hardly any legislation would be amended in this place and we would deal only with what was presented to us at the beginning of the process.

[Sue Hayman]

Clearly, we need to be able to crack on and we must not get too bogged down in consultation. However, we do not want at any stage for this Bill to be able to be challenged. That is very important. There are certain sections of the art market that wish to challenge the Bill. That is why I took that professional advice from the Consultation Institute, so that it would be happy to work with the Department to ensure that there is no opportunity for a legal challenge if another short consultation was held to allow the scope to be extended.

To return to the suggestions of other hon. Members in debates and evidence sessions, the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed spoke very strongly about the need to extend the scope. She said that this is a “one-off opportunity” to highlight the other mammals that would be affected. My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East said:

“We know that this will be the only time we have an Ivory Bill before this House for many years to come, so if we are going to try to protect those species, it makes sense for us to do it now, in this Bill.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 105.]

The right hon. Member for North Shropshire, who is a former Environment Secretary, raised an important point on Second Reading. He said:

“The Secretary of State should also be able to include other ivory-bearing species not listed in the CITES appendices”,

an important point made previously by the hon. Member for North Dorset. The right hon. Member for North Shropshire went on:

“As the Born Free Foundation has indicated, there has been an increase in the purchasing of hippo and other non-elephant ivory in the UK to replace elephant ivory in the internal trade. The BFF infers that the legal and illegal trades are targeting these other species, as the Government’s focus is on elephant ivory.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 104.]

It is important to keep the focus on elephant ivory, but we must not lose sight of what else is happening.

Ivory Bill (Sixth sitting)

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Committee Debate: 6th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 19th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Kerry McCarthy]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. We have heard that this is big business. There are organised criminal gangs involved in poaching ivory. We have seen in the past how they will move from one lucrative criminal activity to another. If the elephant trade is closed to them, which we hope it will be, they will move on and find new pastures.

I have mentioned a couple of species involved. Alongside those in appendix II there are also killer whales, hippos and certain types of dolphin. Appendix III includes the walruses. It is estimated that up to 3% of their global population are hunted and killed every year.

I want to make a final plea for the poor old warthog, which no one seems to care very much about—[Interruption.] Maybe it was discussed this morning. We have to look at why we are introducing an ivory ban. It is mostly presented as a conservation issue that threatens the survival of the elephant, which could be wiped from the face of the earth. We should look at it from the point of view that taking an animal’s teeth just for the purpose of ornamentation or to make money out of it has to be wrong, whether it is rare, precious and wonderful to look at, or an ugly old warthog, of which there are many running around. I argue that we should not hunt animals for ivory, whether they are endangered or not.

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

I will speak briefly to amendment 12, which I tabled following a suggestion from the hon. Member for North Dorset, who unfortunately is not in his place at the moment. He suggested that in clause 35(3) everything following the word “only” should be deleted, so that it would read:

“The regulations may amend subsection (1) so as to include ivory from an animal or species not for the time being covered by that subsection.”

That would allow us to look at non-CITES species, a point raised by a number of hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire. That would include mammoth, for example. There is obviously also the dear warthog. My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East missed a treat this morning when the hon. Member for North Dorset threatened to sing a song about the warthog in order to draw attention to its plight. She might like to have a word in private, to ask if he could entertain her.

Amendment 11 seeks to extend the scope of the Bill. Amendment 12 would allow us to consider any animal that might be affected in future by displacement or removal of other species from poaching, for example. This is an important area to consider. I hope that the Government will consider it seriously, because it is a simple amendment that would attract cross-party support.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)]

I will speak to amendments 11 and 12 and clause stand part. I warn colleagues that this will be a lengthy contribution, but that is fitting, given the contributions we have heard. I will take interventions, and I know that the hon. Member for Workington will wrap up with her final thoughts. She made a few detailed points about consultation, and the fact that she is an associate of the Consultation Institute and is taking guidance and advice from it. We would be happy to look into that. As a Minister, I need to take guidance from other sources within Government too, so there are often different views on these matters. We will of course look at that.

The hon. Member for Leeds North West spoke with passion and conviction about narwhals, and he made some good points. I will write to him with the details on imports. The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport talked about the risk of judicial review. Perhaps he could hold that thought, because in the main body of my remarks I will talk about the biggest risk here, which is of the European Court of Human Rights challenging the provisions in the Bill. We can answer questions as we go. I thank hon. Members for their amendments and would like to acknowledge the significant degree of support, in the House and from conservation organisations, for extending the scope of the Bill to cover other species.

Clause 35 provides the definition of ivory applied in the Bill. Ivory is defined as the tusk or tooth of any species of elephant. Subsection (6) defines elephant as any animal or species that is within the family Elephantidae and that is extant—meaning living—at the time the Bill is passed.

My hon. Friend the Member for Witney questioned whether we should be looking at the chemical composition of ivory, so let us put that on the table as well, as we are all keen to understand the situation. The chemical composition of ivory cannot be used here, or indeed in the CITES or EU wildlife trade regulations, to assist in defining elephant ivory. That is because the chemical composition of all mammal teeth is broadly the same, so this is not a helpful method for distinguishing between species. Instead, a range of other approaches is used to distinguish elephant ivory from other species and other materials such as plastic, including physical characteristics and DNA testing. Therefore, chemical composition or any other practical means of testing ivory cannot be used as a legal definition for elephant ivory, either in the Bill or in international restrictions on ivory, with which it is important that we align.

Many will ask why back in October we consulted only on the sale of elephant ivory. We have moved quickly—not just in this Committee but before—but the short answer is that that is where the clear priority lay at the start. As we heard so clearly from the NGOs last week, their primary aim is to see a world-leading ban on elephant ivory sales enacted in the UK. That is where the Government have acted quickly in response. Also, the UK signed up to a resolution at the last CITES conference committing to close domestic elephant ivory markets. We therefore wanted to do what was necessary to get this legislation on to the statute book as soon as possible.

Elephant ivory is the most commonly found and traded form of ivory. Indeed, during initial consultations with NGOs it was stated that their primary focus was on banning the sale of elephant ivory as it forms the vast majority of the trade. Amendment 11 seeks to protect other endangered ivory-bearing species by extending the scope of the Bill to cover hippos, killer whales, narwhal, sperm whales and walrus. I stress that we share these concerns about other endangered ivory-bearing species and want to do all we can to protect them. Species such as the hippo and the narwhal—the unicorn of the sea—deserve as much protection as the elephant, and the poaching of such creatures for their ivory is equally abhorrent. However, I cannot say what proportion of the UK ivory market concerns non-elephant ivory, as we did not seek that information in our consultation—that consultation was narrower.

That is why the Bill includes, in clause 35, a power for the Secretary of State to lay regulations to widen its scope to cover other endangered ivory-bearing species, such as hippopotamus, narwhal and walrus. That power is broad, and it is not dependent on demonstrating that the banning of elephant ivory has caused the displacement of the market to other species. The hurdle is low.

Clause 35(3) states that regulations may be laid only in respect of ivory-bearing species listed on an appendix to CITES. That is an important qualification. A listing in one of the three appendices to CITES demonstrates that the animal or species requires a degree of protection from trade, for example through restrictions on the trade in that species. Currently, the listed ivory-bearing species to which that may apply are hippopotamus, walrus, killer whale, sperm whale and narwhal. Unfortunately for my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset and the hon. Member for Bristol East, the Bill does not include walruses, but I will come to them in a second.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

I completely understand that. I think we need to pause for a moment, though, to reflect on the fact that we are trying to make a real difference with elephant ivory. There are provisions for all other forms of ivory and I will take away the hon. Lady’s point, but it is worth reflecting on the evidence we had from the NGOs, which was that they like the ban, that it is meaningful that and it is going to make a difference. It will also set a standard for others to follow.

I am sure Opposition Members as well as the Government will reflect on these matters. We will do everything we can to make these provisions as wide-ranging and impactful as possible. As I hope I have described, we need to get through a balance test, and at the moment we do not have enough evidence to support a balance review taking place.

Should warthogs become endangered and listed under CITES, the Bill provides the ability to amend the regulations to reflect that. With my rather lengthy explanation, I hope I have addressed most of the points to be made regarding clause stand part. I say to my hon. Friends and Opposition Members that I am committed to considering whether steps can be taken to use the subsection (3) powers as soon as possible after commencement so that all statutory instruments and guidance to enforce the ban on elephant ivory are in place. However, I am happy to consider the evidence and data required for a balance review.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister. During the discussion on amendment 11 and extending the scope of the Bill, it appeared that the Government’s main concern was about further consultation and a potential judicial review.

[David Rutley]

The key point is that this is not about judicial review. I know I am getting a bit techy, but the key thing is that it would be a challenge under the European convention on human rights. To satisfy the requirements of the ECHR, we need to review whether we have looked not just at the general interest in the ban but in the rights of individuals, in particular to do with possessions, that are enshrined in the ECHR. That is why we have to do the balance test. What I am trying to get across to the Committee is that we need to ensure that we have the evidence—we want to gather it as quickly as possible—but there is still a requirement to do the balance test.

[Sue Hayman]

We have talked about how we could do the consultation quickly, and the Minister has made a commitment to talk to the Consultation Institute about that. As far as human rights go, according to the legal advice I have taken primary legislation can be challenged only on human rights and EU law grounds. I have been informed that in the case of human rights, the argument would have to rest on article 1 of protocol 1, on the “peaceful enjoyment” of property, but that is subject to a public interest caveat. On those grounds, we can justify the inclusion of other creatures—such as on the grounds of endangerment—in the same way as we can elephants. That is the legal information that I have received, so I put it on the record.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for setting out her view. At this point, I think we strongly agree with each other. On helping to get people familiar with the provisions, that is exactly what the Government say—it is an ECHR requirement, so it is about getting the fair balance review in place. We are perhaps using slightly different language about what we are trying to describe, but we are saying the same thing.

[Sue Hayman]

The legal advice I have been given is that that need not mean that we cannot extend the scope of the Bill and miss the conference deadline in October, which the Government are clearly keen to meet. I would be keen to look at how to extend the scope now, because that is what most people would prefer from the Bill at the beginning, rather than coming back to it through secondary legislation at a later date—we do not know when that would happen.

In response to points made during the debate, including by the Minister, I would say that the most important thing is to get the Bill absolutely right and to get it into legislation as quickly as possible. However, I do not think a conference date should be the ultimate deadline. We need to get the legislation correct regardless of whether that means we miss the conference deadline by a week or two—it is more important to get it right. A lot seems to be about the Government having the will to make the Bill the best they possibly can. We are in Committee to work with the Government, genuinely, to make a positive and helpful addition to what can be achieved though this groundbreaking piece of legislation.

I am disappointed that the Government are not prepared to consider amendment 12, because we know that non-CITES species are already being affected and are likely to be further affected by the displacement that we all agree will occur, or is likely to occur, once the ban on ivory comes into effect. We know that mislabelling as mammoth is used to confuse or misrepresent potential purchasers. The Minister talked about Schreger lines—I am not even sure of the spelling of that, and it is something I have learned during the debate. I had not heard of them, I would not know what they looked like and I do not think that the average punter would either, so I think it is important to understand more about what is happening with the use of mammoth.

Finally, I reinforce what my hon. Friends the Members for Bristol East and for Redcar said. We do not want to wait for an animal to become endangered before we step in and do something about its persecution. I ask the Minister to look again at amendment 12, but in the case of amendment 11, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

New clause 2 is about reporting on the international ivory market. We are asking that:

“Within 12 months of section 1 of this Act coming into force, the Secretary of State must publish and lay before each House of Parliament a report on the international ivory market.”

The idea is that the report would provide practical analysis of the impact of the Bill on demand for ivory in the United Kingdom and in other countries. Importantly, we would want it to consider the impact on nations or communities that generate income from ivory. We are also looking at the work of the Department for International Development in reducing the global demand for ivory and mitigating any negative impact that the provisions of this Bill would have on those nations or communities.

The reason for tabling the new clause is that it is important to keep a close, watchful eye on any implications of the Bill on the international ivory market and the communities that will be most affected by an ivory ban. During the evidence sessions, a number of hon. Members asked about the international ivory market and what contribution the Bill could make specifically toward deterring poaching and having a wider impact on the illegal worldwide trade.

Recent analysis has shown that the United Kingdom is the largest supplier to the world’s legal ivory market, with more than 36,000 legal ivory items exported from the UK in the five years between 2010 and 2015. It is also one of the largest importers to China and Hong Kong. As we also heard during the evidence sessions, seizure data shows that, alongside the legal market, the UK plays an increasing role in the illegal ivory trade in import, in export and as a transit country. The president of the Born Free Foundation, for example, said:

“Investment in wildlife law enforcement in Africa is really important.”

He also said that, in his view,

“there is a common linkage with our clear objectives in overseas development,”

which are to do with poverty and providing opportunities, and that:

“If we are not investing in the…areas where elephants and other species live, we are not doing a great service either…to the people who live…downstream from those protected areas.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 9, Q12.]

In the evidence session, the International Fund for Animal Welfare made reference to the discussion on Second Reading about how some of the Department for International Development’s budget might be used. I am aware that the hon. Member for Cheltenham also mentioned that on Second Reading. IFAW said that

“the impact of poaching on communities is not isolated from the illegal wildlife trade…There are good opportunities that exist with our overseas development budget to take a more integrated approach to delivering holistic aid and support and anti-poaching measures, to help build communities and tackle corruption...It is all part of a jigsaw that really helps, but our overseas aid is another part that we could potentially re-examine and look at, to provide better integrated aid.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 14, Q18.]

I do not know whether hon. Members saw it, but this morning CNN released a very interesting report on what has happened to the poaching of African elephants following the ban that the Chinese Government imposed on ivory on 1 January. CNN went to Mozambique specifically to see whether that ban was having an impact on poaching. I will just mention a few things about that report, because if we are looking to introduce our own legislation we need to look at the impact of other legislation on ivory from around the world, to see what areas we need to work in; perhaps that other legislation is not being as effective as it could have been.

One of the things that the CNN investigation found was that six months after that ban smugglers were still working with near-impunity. As I said, CNN went to Mozambique, to the Niassa reserve, which is one of the last great wildernesses in southern Africa. What the CNN team found was that the different officers who work there trying to stop poaching told them that corruption is the source of poaching. Looking to invest, along with DFID, to start to tackle that corruption will be really important if this Bill is to have the effect we want.

CNN said that the huge Niassa reserve should be home to thousands of elephants, but it is now thought that less than 2,000 are left there, which is really shocking. As part of its investigation, CNN also interviewed the people actually doing the poaching. Just as the drug lord obviously does not go and harvest his own cocaine, in the same way the people who are actually making money out of poaching do not go out and shoot the elephants themselves.

CNN went to a prison where there was a suspected poacher, and he said: “We were in the bush when we found a group of elephants. I shot the first one, then I shot the second one.” He then said that he had already spent a year in jail for a separate poaching incident. But his choices are limited; he said that he would do anything to help his family escape grinding poverty. He said, “I went poaching because I was suffering. I had nothing to survive on and I was desperate.”

So the poachers who kill elephants are usually poor and just looking for a way to feed themselves and their family, and often they do not have alternatives to wildlife crime. Poverty is causing poaching in Mozambique. Even if the Chinese ban had ended the market, or if the ban that we are putting place ended it, the poachers on the ground would continue this behaviour.

The new clause is designed to consider how we can do something to tackle that problem, take the focus of the Bill beyond just this country and do something to look at what causes poaching in the first place.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for tabling the new clause, the intention of which is clear, and it would potentially provide useful information. However, gaining such information could be a considerable and potentially expensive undertaking that is likely to require the engagement of outside experts or organisations, even though the full costs and benefits of this ban may not be fully known within the first 12 months of its coming into force.

As explained in the accompanying impact assessment of the Bill, no single comprehensive data source exists about the domestic ivory trade. Recent studies, including by TRAFFIC, the University of Portsmouth and Two Million Tusks have provided some useful evidence. However, each of these sources has its limitations with regard to generalising to wider regions or sectors.

Internationally, a key assumption is that other countries will be positively influenced by the UK lead and implement their own bans, which will reduce demand, prices, and therefore the poaching and killing of elephants. That is what we all want. However, while there have been many reports into various aspects of ivory and its trade—the UK has conducted some—I am not aware that there is a single comprehensive data source that would allow for the type of analysis that is being proposed.

Furthermore, I am conscious that such an undertaking may in effect duplicate some of the work being undertaken under the auspices of CITES, whereby reports on the illegal killing of elephants and the trade in ivory are presented every three years to each CITES conference of the parties. All countries implicated in the ivory trade, including the UK, appear in the cluster analysis of the ivory trade reports.

Those reports are “Monitoring of Illegal Trade in Ivory and Other Elephant Specimens” and the “Elephant Trade Information System”—ETIS. While the reports are the not perfect and have their critics, they are the best we have at this time.

I also believe that a report objectively analysing the effect of the illegal ivory trade on the UK would be best carried out by an organisation outside Government. That should probably be a conservation organisation experienced in analysing regulations on the illegal wildlife trade and in reporting its findings to the public and the Government.

--- Later in debate ---

To summarise, I am not able to agree to inserting the new clause in the Bill, but its intention has merit and we will consider the ways in which we might report on the Bill’s impact. With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw the motion.

[Sue Hayman]

I just make the point that, if we are serious about stopping poaching and having a real impact on the ivory trade with any legislation, it is important that we look at that global aspect, not just through the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs but through the Department for International Development and maybe through the Foreign Office, in order to have a clear and holistic approach. It is easy for us to sit here and pat ourselves on the back and be smug about this marvellous piece of legislation, but if it does not actually stop the poaching and does not do what we say it will, we do not have any right to feel smug or pleased with ourselves.

[David Rutley]

I understand the hon. Lady’s point. It was clear on Second Reading and in Committee that we have to appreciate the wider sense of what is going on and the wider global implications. We also have to recognise that the Bill is one piece of the co-ordinated approach that we are taking to tackling this problem.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 3

Assessment of enforcement resources

“(1) Within 12 months of section 12 of this Act coming into force, the Secretary of State must make an assessment on the resources available to enforce the prohibition.

(2) The report shall consider in particular—

(a) the resources allocated or planned to be allocated towards enforcing the prohibition,

(b) the potential impact of any change in resources so allocated or planned to be allocated, and

(c) the impact on other law or border enforcement activities of the resources so allocated or planned to be allocated.

(3) The Secretary of State shall lay a report of the assessment under this section before each House of Parliament as soon as practicable after its completion.”.—(Sue Hayman.)

This new clause requires an assessment to be made and laid before Parliament regarding the level of resources allocated or proposed to be allocated to enforcing the prohibition against ivory dealing.

Brought up, and read the First time.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

--- Later in debate ---

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time. The new clause is about internet services, about which we had quite a lot of discussion during the evidence sessions and on Second Reading. The new clause provides for the power to require service providers to block access to material that facilitates a breach of the prohibition. I will not run through all the detail—we have all had it in front of us—but under the new clause, internet service providers may be requested by the Secretary of State to block access to any online deal that facilitates a breach of the prohibition, and the Secretary of State may obtain court orders to ensure that the internet service providers comply with such a request.

The matter has been discussed in quite a lot of detail. I am aware that the Minister has said previously that he feels the Bill is robust when it comes to internet services, but I respectfully say that not every hon. Member and every person giving evidence has agreed with that. That is why we decided to table the new clause: to try to toughen up the rules on internet sales and the Secretary of State’s ability to step in if they felt the internet service providers were not behaving as they should.

During discussions, we had a look at a number of items being sold on eBay. On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) talked about a recent International Fund for Animal Welfare report on wildlife cyber-crime and said that eBay had removed 25,000 ivory listings from its site in just one year. It is a huge number and it is a good start, but from what we have been made aware of during the evidence sessions, it is clearly only scratching the surface of the problem.

In response to one of my questions during the evidence session, Chief Inspector Hubble said:

“We would certainly welcome better self-policing and self-regulating by online auction houses with some responsibility on them for the items that they are making money from the sale of.”—[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 43, Q92.]

By putting this responsibility on them through the new clause, they will know that if they do not take the ban seriously, action will be taken to shut them down.

We know, from having dealt in the House with issues around other internet providers and online digital companies, that they are not always the easiest to work with when it comes to looking at different legal aspects. It is important that they take responsibility for what they are selling. It is often a problem that they like to push what they are selling and what is said on their sites to one side. It is important to think about how they can be properly held to account.

During the evidence session, my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon asked a question of Alexander Rhodes and he replied,

“if it were possible the Bill should say that ivory may not be bought and sold over the internet because that would make it so much simpler for the enforcement guys.”—[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 27, Q49.]

We know that that is not a practical solution either, so it is about how we can introduce proper enforcement.

Chief Inspector Hubble again said something that was worth considering:

“I would love to have a dedicated cyber-team looking at this day in, day out, with real training and a focused effort. Lots of people in the NGOs we work with are doing work around cyber-related crime. We are in the process of setting up a cyber-working group”—

that is with the NWCU—

“to try to pull some of that effort and interaction together”.—[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 36, Q63.]

That will be a significant resource.

We have talked about resources previously and I do not particularly want to do that now, but it is important that the size of the problem when it comes to cyber-crime and managing the internet is properly recognised and that sufficient safeguards are put in place. We need to ensure that we pursue every single avenue we can to stop the trade in ivory. Tackling internet ivory trading will be the best way to stop this. We know that, right across the country, no matter what is being sold, more and more people are selling online, so we know that that trade is likely to increase. From what we have seen on eBay, it is also likely that that is where the illegal trade—items described as bone or as mammoth—will increase.

I am not convinced that the Bill provides for tackling the internet’s facilitating the global ivory trade sufficiently to make a real difference. That is is why we have tabled the new clause. I would like to hear the Minister’s views on that.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for tabling the new clause. Most people recognise that while the internet can be a helpful tool, it can also be used to facilitate and perpetuate criminal acts. In that context, I understand the intention of the new clause. Paragraph 5(1)(a) of schedule 1 allows the Secretary of State to serve a stop notice on a body such as an internet service provider to stop it displaying material that facilitates a breach of the prohibition. It is an important point. It is possible to serve a stop notice, and that in essence mirrors what the new clause seeks to achieve. The schedule could apply to an online sales forum such as eBay or an internet service provider, although in practice the latter, whether it be British Telecom or another internet service provider, would be a higher bar for the enforcement body. The better focus of attention through such stop notices would be the online sales forum itself.

Moreover, the Bill confers broad powers on the regulatory body, whose role should not be forgotten: the Office for Product Safety and Standards addresses online breaches of the ban. Clause 21, for example, allows a regulator to require the production of documents where the officer thinks they are relevant to an offence. This may mean documents or other materials from online companies and sales forums that provide evidence that an online company has facilitated a breach of the ban.

In addition, the NWCU is an intelligence unit that plays an important role in supporting police forces, as we have already highlighted. They have observed an increase in the use of the internet to enable and facilitate many types of wildlife crime. They have identified cyber-crime as a thematic threat area on which they are going to focus. Working with the OPSS will help with this task.

It is also worth considering this amendment with respect to the broader picture around the governance of the internet. The hon. Lady will know that this is a big, important question that is currently being addressed by the UK and Governments around the world. The way in which Government and society approach internet governance is a major strategic challenge, and it will not be tackled by this Bill alone. In January 2018, the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport launched the digital charter. It is to be a rolling programme of work to agree norms and rules for the online world and put them into practice, and it should give confidence. In some cases it will involve shifting behavioural expectations. We will need to agree new standards, or we may need to update our laws and regulations. Our starting point is that we will have the same rights and expect the same behaviour online as we do offline. That is important. With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to consider withdrawing the motion.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for that explanation. Schedule 1 states that a stop notice may be served on “a person”. It does not mention service providers or organisations; it specifically refers to “a person”, and the explanatory notes do not mention organisations, the internet—or online at all. I am not convinced that it covers what we are trying to achieve with the new clause.

[David Rutley]

It is my turn to scurry around. I cannot readily find the definition of “person”. All I can say is that we are very committed—[Interruption.] Inspiration has arrived. The definition of “person” is wide enough to capture businesses, and therefore ISPs. We can see that from clause 34. The definition of “person” is broad enough to satisfy that requirement.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sue Hayman]

Again, I thank the Minister for that explanation. It would help if it were properly laid out in the Bill that internet service providers are included, so that we have absolute clarity when the Bill becomes law and that people realise that that is not the best way of going about trying to sideline what the Bill seeks to achieve.

[David Rutley]

Excellent points have been made. We will certainly clarify that and put it into English—not just legal English—to help everyone understand what has been said. We can do that in guidance notes and by clarifying the scope of the Bill for people who are not so familiar with it. There is a real commitment to address this issue. I hope I have been able to reassure the hon. Lady that there are provisions in the Bill itself, but that we will explain that better. I hope that satisfies her.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the Chair do report the Bill to the House.

[The Chair]

I thank the Committee Clerk, who has kept us all—especially me—on the straight and narrow, which is not easy. I also thank the attendants, who did such a great job of trying to cool us all down; the officials, who behaved themselves; the Hansard reporters, who are the unsung heroes of our democracy, and the broadcasting unit. Finally, may I say to all of you that you have been a lovely Committee?

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly to be reported, without amendment.

Ivory Bill (Third sitting)

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Committee Debate: 3rd sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 14th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[David Rutley]

There is a risk that that could happen, but the Bill covers it, and we will look at that issue in further stages as we go through the Bill, line by line.

Subsection (5) provides a simple definition of ivory in relation to its prohibition by the Bill, capturing that “ivory” covers items made solely of ivory or worked items containing ivory. The clause is integral to banning the dealing of ivory in the UK and to achieving our aims: removing the UK from international trade in ivory; and not fuelling international ivory markets.

For those reasons, I seek the support of members of the Committee and I move that this clause stand part.

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for his speech and for recognising the importance of our working together constructively across the House on this very important Bill, because the Labour party welcomes this Bill. It is a good piece of legislation and one that we wish to support.

The amendments and new clauses that we have tabled for debate in Committee have been tabled in the spirit of co-operation, to improve the Bill and make it the best it can possibly be, as we work to ban the ivory trade.

I have a small query about subsection (2). During the evidence sessions, concerns were expressed by museums staff about the definition of “dealing” and about how loans for exhibitions could fall foul of the Bill. For example, Anthony Misquitta of the Victoria and Albert Museum said:

“The terminology used in the Bill is ‘dealing’, and the definition of dealing includes the word ‘hiring’. I am sure the intention is not to capture these loans, but as it is currently drafted the Bill does capture them.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 61.]

In the Bill’s explanatory notes, page 9 says quite clearly that,

“the prohibition applies to the exchange of ivory for any good or service and, therefore, is not restricted to financial transactions, or exchanges for money.”

Hiring or offering to hire ivory are prohibited activities; such activities include temporarily obtaining an ivory item in return for a payment or other exchange of goods.

Therefore museums raised the concerns that loans of ivory for exhibition could fall foul of subsection (4) (b), and be seen as “hiring” the ivory, although they would receive nothing in return. Can the Minister confirm for me and reassure museums that that will not be the case, and that loans to and from museums will not fall foul of the legislation? Also, could appropriate guidance be provided to museums that are supporting the Bill, so that they can properly understand the situation?

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for those questions. It is worth reiterating the point about the so-called swapping of pieces of ivory. So that Members on both sides of the Committee understand, that would be considered bartering, because it would be exchanging for a valuable consideration, so it would be prohibited.

The point about museum loans is a very good one, which was raised in our excellent evidence session. Loans between accredited museums, or from a private owner to an accredited museum, would be considered hiring and therefore would be permitted under the terms in the Bill for museums.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 2

Pre-1918 items of outstanding artistic etc value and importance

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. The Bill provides for that. The hon. Member for Workington raised some interesting questions around this, which we will debate shortly. For the reasons that my hon. Friend set out, agents will have the ability to get involved in that process.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for that explanation. I ask for one more small clarification, which I think should be quite straightforward. Subsection (5) talks about prescribed institutions, and page 10 of the explanatory notes says that it

“confers a delegated power on the Secretary of State…to designate and update a list of institutions”.

However, the Bill does not mention updating. Will the Minister clarify that that is the position?

Will the Minister also clarify whether that provides the Secretary of State with the ability to remove an institution if for any reason that institution does not meet the required standard?

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for those points. On updating the list, yes, those powers will absolutely be available through delegated powers. On removing bodies from that list, yes, the Secretary of State will absolutely have that power if required. Let us hope it is not.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 2 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 3

Applications for exemption certificates

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move amendment 1, in clause 3, page 2, line 29, leave out “a person” and insert

“An owner of an item when”.

This amendment would clarify that only the owner of an item can apply for an exemption.

This should be fairly straightforward. It refers back to clause 2(4), which, as we have just heard from the hon. Member for Cheltenham, states:

“An exemption certificate for an item may be issued only on the application of the owner of the item.”

However, clause 3(1) states:

“A person applying for an exemption certificate for an item must—”.

To tidy this up so that both subsections use the same language and to avoid any confusion, the amendment suggests amending clause 3(1) to read:

“An owner of an item when applying for an exemption certificate for an item must—”,

so that those two subsections work together effectively and efficiently.

[David Rutley]

I understand that the amendment’s intention is to clarify that only an owner of an item can apply for an exemption certificate. However, although I understand the point that the hon. Lady makes, I do not think the amendment is appropriate. It is the Government’s intention that the application for an exemption certificate under clause 2 will be completed by the owner or by somebody acting on behalf of the owner. This is intended to take into account the owner’s circumstances; the owner may have instructed an agent to act on their behalf, or the owner may not be capable of completing the registration process—due to illness, for instance—so a family member may be able to do so on their behalf.

Subsection (1)(a) states that the name and address of the owner must be stipulated on an exemption application, which reflects the concerns that prompted the tabling of the amendment. Under clause 10, the item is registered using the owner’s details. The primary intention of the clause is to ensure that items meet the criteria for the applicable exemption. The identity of the person making the application is much less significant than ensuring that items containing ivory that should be prohibited from dealings are restricted from the market. For those reasons, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[Sue Hayman]

I am happy to withdraw the amendment. With reference to what the hon. Member for Cheltenham said earlier, it would be good if the guidelines clarified exactly what some of the terminology means and who is then applicable.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move amendment 2, in clause 3, page 3, line 5, at end insert—

“(2A) Where an application it referred to a prescribed institution, the institution must notify the Secretary of State of any intention that the institution may have to purchase or hire the item.”

This amendment requires a prescribed institution to declare any interest that it may have in acquiring the item, in order to make the Secretary of State aware of any conflicts of interest.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 3, in clause 3, page 3, line 13, at end insert “, and

(d) notify the Secretary of State of any interests, whether commercial, pecuniary, or personal, that the assessor may hold in respect of—

(i) the person applying for an exemption certificate, and

(ii) any person known to by the assessor to be seeking to buy or hire the item.

(3A) If the Secretary of State believes that any interests declared under subsection (3)(d) create a conflict of interest, the Secretary of State may deem the assessor to not be nominated by the prescribed institution, and shall notify the institution accordingly.”

This amendment requires the assessor to make a declaration of their interests, and grants a power to the Secretary of State to deem an assessor to not have been nominated if the Secretary of State believes there to be a conflict of interest.

[Sue Hayman]

Amendments 2 and 3 takes us back to concerns raised with me about potential conflicts of interest when prescribed institutions acquire an item. Amendment 2 is designed to give confidence that acquisitions are transparent and that conflicts of interest would therefore not arise. There are also concerns about conflicts of interest between nominated assessors and prescribed institutions, but I will come on to that when I speak to amendment 3. On amendment 2, I hope the Minister will want to ensure that the Bill is as transparent as possible and that we do not have a situation in which conflicts of interest can arise between a prescribed institution and anyone else involved in the application.

As I have said, amendment 3 is designed to deal with conflicts of interest between nominated assessors and prescribed institutions. The concern is that the Secretary of State prescribes the institutions but the institutions can then choose their own assessors who may not be employed by the institutions. We need to be clear that there is no vested interest and no conflict within the commercial trading. The amendment seeks assurances that there are no conflicts of interest in the appointment of an assessor and that if any concerns arise at a later date the Secretary of State will be able to step in and take action. Both amendments seek to minimise the risk of conflicts of interests, in order to give full confidence in the certification process.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for her suggestions in the two amendments. On amendment 2, we would all agree that a declaration of a conflict of interest is a necessary requirement in many areas. I do not, however, believe that the amendment is necessary, as I hope I will be able reassure the hon. Lady, because we intend to take measures to that effect.

Clause 3 provides for the certification process that applies to pre-1918 items of outstanding artistic value and importance, and takes into account whether the item is rare and the extent to which it is important. The clause also sets out the role of the designated assessor. Our aim is to appoint eminent museums and academic institutions to act as assessors for the exemption. We are in discussion with some of those institutions. We have built safeguards into the process by which they will be able to provide advice. We intend that the institution and assessor will be asked to sign a waiver before accepting a commission to assess an item from APHA to confirm that they have no commercial interest in that item. The final decision whether an item meets an exemption will fall to the Secretary of State through the APHA.

On amendment 3, it is feasible that an institution asked to assess an item might wish to acquire it for its own collection, thus leading to a potential conflict of interest. Additionally, the pool of owners and collectors of such items will clearly be small. In some cases, the assessing expert might even know the owner through seeing the item. We therefore intend that advisory institutions and the assessors that they appoint to assess an item will sign a waiver to the effect that they have no interest in purchasing an item when accepting a request to assess it. Obviously, that will be a very small set of circumstances because, as we heard in the evidence session on Tuesday, the number of transactions will be very small. With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for his explanation. I would be interested to know more about how the waiver will be built into the Bill, to give me confidence that it will be structurally part of it.

[David Rutley]

I will seek some inspiration to ensure that the hon. Member for Workington, which is an incredibly nice part of the world—

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

My goodness! I do not think I can disagree with a word of that. We are forever grateful. Indeed, I am genuinely grateful for the conversations that we have had outside the Committee and elsewhere. We are all trying to progress the Bill, and these questions are absolutely right.

The point made by the hon. Member for Redcar is particularly interesting and I would like to consider it further. We would all agree that we want museums to be able to acquire important items for public enjoyment, so we need to further understand the implications of the point she raised.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for that further explanation; I appreciate it. On the understanding that a memorandum of understanding will lay out all those areas so we cannot fall foul of any conflicts of interest or difficulties within the certificate, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 1— Reporting requirements: Exemption certificates—

“(1) As soon as reasonably practicable after the end of each calendar year, the Secretary of State must—

(a) prepare a report on applications for exemption certificates that have been granted during that year, and—

(i) lay a copy of that report before Parliament, and

(ii) publish the report.

(2) Subsection (1) does not apply in relation to a year if section 3 of this Act has not been in force at any time in that year.

(3) A report prepared under this section must include the following in respect of each exemption certificate granted—

(a) the description or descriptions provided in accordance with section 3(1)(b) by the person that applied for the exemption certificate,

(b) the photograph or photographs provided in accordance with section 3(1)(c) by the person that applied for the exemption certificate,

(c) when the certificate was granted, and

(d) any other information that the Secretary of State considers appropriate.”

This new clause requires an annual report to be published with details and pictures of all items that are granted an exemption certificate under section 3.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

As I was saying, the Animal and Plant Health Agency, on behalf of the Secretary of State, will check that all necessary information has been completed and that the application is reasonable. For example, if the application is clearly for an item that is not pre-1918, that will not be considered reasonable and it will be rejected. If satisfied, the APHA will refer the application to an appropriate designated assessor, provided for under clause 2. Although the application’s initial stages will be similar to those for the self-registration system—submitting requested information via the online system—the certification process diverges significantly, as the information provided will be passed by APHA to one of the listed prescribed institutions for expert advice, as discussed earlier.

As we discussed in response to amendments 2 and 3, the institution will be required to confirm via a waiver that it has no commercial interest in the item before accepting a commission. That is to avoid any potential conflicts of interest. The assessor, as a relevant expert, will be best qualified to assess the item against the conditions of the exemption. APHA will then decide whether to issue an exemption certificate, taking into account all relevant factors, including the expert assessor’s advice.

When making an application, the applicant must pay a fee as set by the Secretary of State through regulations. In practice, the set fee will be paid to cover the application’s administration costs. If referred to an expert assessor, an additional fee will be paid to cover reasonable costs incurred by the assessor. The additional fee will be considerably higher than the fee applicable to the self-registration process, reflecting the specialist advice needed and the limited number of unique items for which the process is designed to cater.

I thank the hon. Member for Workington for tabling new clause 1. Clause 10(5) sets out the minimum information and evidence that the Secretary of State must record with regard to both successful and revoked exemptions to applications. That information includes a description of the item and photographs and expected dealings in the item. Furthermore, statutory guidance to be published before the Bill comes into force may stipulate further information requirements to be captured. The Government share the hon. Lady’s aim of being informative to the public and agree that being as transparent as possible about how the system is working in practice will be essential to ensuring public confidence in it. As such, I assure her and the Committee that we already intend to publish headline data on the number of exemption certificates issued each year for items exempted under clause 2.

I will, however, issue a note of caution with regard to publishing the information described in subsections 3(a) to (d) of the new clause. The exemption will apply to a very limited number of outstandingly important items. As such, and particularly when considering the small number of people who are likely to own and wish to sell such items, it is highly possible that the owner may be identifiable through the publication of photos and so on of an item, which would have serious repercussions in terms of personal privacy and data protection. Any information that the Government publish on annual exemptions must be fully in line with the Data Protection Act 2018. In the light of the assurances that the Government intend to publish information on the number of certificates issued, and with reference to the provisions of the Data Protection Act, I ask the hon. Lady not to press the new clause.

[Sue Hayman]

The reason for tabling the new clause is that quite a number of people felt that this was an important issue, on Second Reading, in the written evidence and in the oral evidence sessions. If there is a proper report, as opposed to a headline report, that would provide us with important, ongoing evidence and allow for confidence in the Act. All items, not just the headline items that have been granted an exemption certificate, would be included in the reporting requirement under the register that we propose.

I will refer to some of those who have said that they would like to see such a register. On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire made an excellent suggestion. She said:

“It would be useful if DEFRA published a register showing how many exemptions have been issued under the historical, artistic and cultural definition every year, so that a picture could be built up of all the relevant artefacts, which would be verified by people who know what they are doing, such as the V&A and other museums.”

She also suggested that the register should be publicly available, in order to

“demonstrate a commitment that the exemption is for the rarest and most important items only, not just any old ivory artefact.”—[Official Report, 4 June 2018; Vol. 642, c. 116.]

The International Fund for Animal Welfare and Born Free both support the proposal. They told us in evidence:

“It is absolutely critical...that we should be publicly accountable for what is being listed.”––[Official Report, Ivory Public Bill Committee, 12 June 2018; c. 17, Q24.]

A public register would go some way towards establishing a wider understanding and consensus about what constitutes the rarest and most important items, which we know prompted much discussion during the drafting of the Bill. Having a publicly available register would help to inform that process as we go forward. We are not talking about a lot of items. IFAW has suggested that it would be about 75 to 100 items a year, which should not be a huge burden on the Government. Having a publicly available register also provides proper scrutiny and transparency to the legislation and the processes involved.

The Minister confirmed on Second Reading that he would be happy to look at how data could be published, including using a new IT system that would be developed to facilitate the task. I would ask that he does that. I know that he has raised concerns about security and data protection, but I feel sure that we could come up with a method of photographing, data collection and registering that need not fall foul of either data protection or identification and security laws. I do not see why photographing an item in a particular way, as they do for museum catalogues and auctions, would require the identification of the owner. I ask the Minister to reconsider the new clause.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for her points. She makes an important point—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

The hon. Lady makes a good point. We are trying to get the right balance between privacy and transparency. That is a real challenge in lots of legislation. I also point out that items that are registered, as opposed to certified, will come under clause 10. We will publish data on those items as well.

We are looking at ways of making it as transparent as possible, but the issue with the rarest and most important items is that they are more easily identifiable with an individual than items in some other categories, which is why it might be more difficult in this area than in others. I hope that explanation is helpful. We will do everything we can to try to bring transparency. We are very committed to doing that, and I will work with officials, while the Bill is in Committee and beyond, to see how we can make that more definitive.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for all his comments and for taking the matter seriously. However, because of the number of people who stressed that they felt that this was incredibly important, both for transparency and for getting a proper understanding of the kinds of items that we are looking at in order properly to monitor what the Bill is achieving, I stand by the new clause and would like to press it to a vote.

[The Chair]

On a point of procedure, to guide the Committee, the Question that I am about to put relates to clause 3. New clause 1 would be decided upon, if Members so chose, at the end of proceedings, after we have deliberated the contents of the Bill as it stands. The Question now relates to clause 3, not new clause 1.

[David Rutley]

Mr Pritchard, I think we need a bit more clarification. We want to ensure that everybody is clear.

[Sue Hayman]

Yes—at exactly what stage will we have a vote on new clause 1?

[The Chair]

New clause 1 will be decided on after we have considered all the clauses and schedules already in the Bill as drafted. All new clauses, whatever their number, come after all the clauses and schedules have been decided upon—they always come at the end—but there will be an opportunity to vote on the new clause if the shadow Minister wishes to press it to a Division.

[Sue Hayman]

Thank you for that clarification, Mr Pritchard.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 3 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 4

Further provision about exemption certificates

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move amendment 4, in clause 4, page 4, line 8, at end insert—

‘(5A) Subject to subsection (5B), the Secretary of State may not issue a replacement certificate in respect of an item if a replacement certificate has previously been issued in respect of the same item.

(5B) Subsection (5A) does not apply where—

(a) an exemption certificate has been applied for under section 3, and issued, in respect of the item since the last instance of a replacement certificate being issued,

(b) the owner of the item has changed since the last instance of a replacement certificate being issued, or

(c) it seems to the Secretary of State that there are extraneous circumstances that warrant issuing a further replacement certificate.’

This amendment creates a limit of one replacement certificate being issued for an item. After one certificate is issued, a further replacement certificate can only be issued if a new certificate is applied for under section 3, or if the owner of the item changes, or if there are extraneous circumstances that warrant issuing a replacement certificate.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to consider clause stand part.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sue Hayman]

The amendment is about further provision for exemption certificates. Under subsection (5), we are looking at a particular concern to do with potential abuse of replacement certificates, which came up a number of times in evidence. Proposed new subsection (5A) limits the Secretary of State, subject to a number of exemptions under proposed new subsection (5B), to ensure that we do not end up with a situation in which a lot of certificates are flying around the place.

The issue was raised in Tuesday’s evidence sessions by the chief executive of the Tusk Trust. He expressed his concerns and said that more safeguards were needed for replacement certificates because, as things stand, an item could have several replacement certificates which could be used to sell similar items legally.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have the case of a constituent who is trying to get a second replacement passport. The stipulation is that he has to go to the Home Office for an interview, to verify his identity and why he needs a second replacement passport, and to provide his documentation. That is to prevent passport fraud. Surely the same conditions should apply to replacement exemption certificates.

[Sue Hayman]

It is really important. We heard an awful lot during the various evidence sessions about how the UK is one of the largest markets in the legal ivory trade. A knock-on effect of that, however, is that we help the illegal ivory trade, simply because of how the whole trade operates. We therefore want to clamp down on the illegal ivory trade and on the ivory trade in this country, because we need to ensure that we leave no loopholes and that nothing in the Bill could be abused by unscrupulous people. If we are not careful with the replacement certificates, as my hon. Friend said, it is possible that more than one replacement certificate could be issued for one item over a period of time and then used to sell on a third item.

IFAW was also concerned about that, stressing that more safeguards were needed to issue replacement certificates, because in theory an ivory item could have several replacement certificates issued over a number of years, and unscrupulous people might use such a certificate to sell similar items legally. Given that the whole point of the Bill is to stop illegal ivory trading and the poaching of elephants, we need to ensure against any such opportunities for unscrupulous people. Any replacement certificates must be issued rarely and with due consideration.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for her amendment, which recognises an important issue: to ensure that, through our legislation, we do not create any loopholes—something she is keen to avoid, as we all are—that could be exploited by those wishing to circumvent the ivory ban and continue to trade ivory illegally. I understand the concern that an individual might exploit the provision to issue replacement certificates under the exemption for the rarest and most important items. Such an individual might, for example, fraudulently use replacement exemption certificates for non-exempt items.

However, we clearly heard from the Victoria and Albert Museum and the British Museum that items exempted under clause 2 will necessarily be unique pieces, meaning that there is an exceedingly low risk that a certificate, which will include a photograph, can be used fraudulently for another item, because they are so unique. I must first say that such an action would of course be an offence under the Fraud Act 2006 and might be subject to criminal sanctions, a custodial sentence or a criminal fine. I also want to reassure the hon. Lady that the process an individual must follow to request a replacement will be carefully developed with APHA, alongside other online application processes required for the implementation of the Bill.

As stated in the Bill, a replacement certificate will be issued only if the original has been lost, the original is not passed on by the original owner when the item is sold, or for any other reason the APHA considers appropriate. It is expected that the owner will need to submit an application to request a replacement and declare why a replacement is required. The APHA will compare information provided by the owner against the database of exempt items to ensure that the item in question has indeed been issued a certificate in the past.

A unique identification number will be included on the certificate, which associates it with the exempt item. Certificates will also include the photographs of the item originally submitted when applying for the exemption and a narrative description of the item. Given the nature of items exempted under this category, it is highly unlikely that there would be another item of such close similarity that it could reasonably be taken to be covered by the certificate issued for another item—they are so distinct and different. That will ensure that prospective buyers and enforcement agencies will be able to check that items for sale are compliant with the ban, and will therefore allow any fraudulent activity to be identified by enforcement agencies and the appropriate sanctions to be applied. With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[Sue Hayman]

Sorry; I just had to look up what the APHA was—I should know these things.

[David Rutley]

Excuse me. It is the Animal and Plant Health Agency. There are a lot of acronyms.

[Sue Hayman]

Yes, quite. Just to confirm, is the Minister talking about developing processes for how it would be managed alongside the Animal and Plant Health Agency?

[David Rutley]

That is correct.

[Sue Hayman]

As this is a fraud issue, is he looking at doing it with any other agencies that have expertise in that area? I do not know whether the Animal and Plant Health Agency has expertise in fraud—I am sorry to be a bit ignorant.

[David Rutley]

I think we are all learning through this process, and Committee stage is about getting into the details and ensuring that we get the right answers to those important questions. The APHA and the enforcement bodies will have full access to the database of exemption certificates, and we have full confidence that they will consider applications for replacements—there will not be many—very sensibly, with reference to the history of applications for that item. The point that I think the hon. Lady was making is whether the enforcement bodies will be engaged in creating the guidance. She is nodding from a sedentary position. My understanding is that we will involve those bodies as well. We want the best expertise to ensure that this process is as watertight as possible.

[David Rutley]

Those are more good questions. I explained a little bit in my remarks—I apologise if I ran through them too quickly. An example would be if a certificate was lost or not passed on appropriately from the original owner when the item was sold. There are situations in which that can happen, and we need to be open to that; we live in a world where people lose things. The hon. Lady makes an important point about tracking. That is where the APHA will be able to log the number of replacements and take the appropriate action. If there is a pattern of behaviour that looks odd, obviously it will be on to that.

The important thing to bear in mind as we go through the Bill is that we are spending a lot of time on the most important areas. It feels like this is a big category, but actually there is a very small number of items. In this particular category it will be much easier to track patterns of behaviour than it would be in some others.

[Sue Hayman]

I may have missed this in the Minister’s comments, but will the number of replacement certificates issued every year be available publicly? Will the register that is being created for items also include whether replacement certificates have been granted for those items?

[David Rutley]

I await a little inspiration on that point, but it is worth pointing out that the Secretary of State can revoke a certificate if he has cause to do so. Some people might not have focused on that. If there is a pattern of behaviour, certificates can be revoked. That is an important point to consider. On the point about the number of replacements that have been put into the public domain and whether that will be published, we certainly will consider that.

[Sue Hayman]

The important thing for us on the replacement certificates is to have proper reassurance that there is no potential for abuse, and that the Minister understands the concerns raised in evidence by a number of organisations. If the register will look carefully at how many certificates are sent out each year, so that we have a clear idea of the situation, that will give us an idea of whether abuse is likely to be taking place. If it is being monitored by the Animal, Plant and Health Agency and tracked and we know that the fraud services are involved, that is extremely useful.

It is really about giving proper reassurance to all the agencies involved that no element is open to abuse. But if the register is tracked and abuse is found to be taking place, even though we are talking about only a small number of items, it would be useful to revisit this, perhaps after 12 or 24 months, just to see whether the replacement certification process is working effectively.

[David Rutley]

This is a real-time conversation—that is what we are here for. Some very good points have been made. I hope that the hon. Lady will gain some reassurance from what I have said; bodies will review the certificates and the replacements will be tracked. On behalf of the Government, I will give due consideration to the proposal for publication. Law enforcement agencies will track this, as they can share and exchange information under the Data Protection Act. That is another layer of protection. We all want a tight system. The steps to achieve that have been set out in this clause.

[Sue Hayman]

On the understanding that the Minister takes the concerns forward and brings into play a lot of the areas that we have discussed and agreed upon, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 4 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 5

Fresh applications and appeals

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

Clause 5 makes provision for an owner of an ivory item either to make a fresh application for an exemption certificate under clause 3, where the Secretary of State has revoked a previously issued certificate under clause 4, which we spoke about, or to appeal the Secretary of State’s decision to refuse a previous application.

The clause simply sets out that any reapplication for an exemption certificate will be treated as a new or fresh application. It will follow the same procedure as set out in clause 3, and will incur the same fees. The clause gives the Secretary of State a delegated power to set in regulations provisions for an appeals process against a decision to refuse an application or to revoke an exemption certificate. The appeals process will give individuals the right to a fair hearing by an independent and impartial panel. That is consistent with article 6 of the European convention on human rights. A recent example of an appeals process that is article 6-compliant and, like the Ivory Bill process, is outlined in secondary legislation, is section 48(3)(f) of the Children and Social Work Act 2017, which allows appeals when courses for mental healthcare professionals are not approved.

Any appeals process is intended to incur fees that are reasonable and proportionate to the cost of dealing with the appeals. Our intention is to establish an appeals process through regulations before the Bill is commenced.

[Sue Hayman]

It is very important that the appeals process is robust. When we look at appeals processes in other Departments, we see how important it is that this appeals process is efficient and effective. Too often, appeals get bogged down. We must look at the Department’s resources and how it will handle appeals to ensure that people do not have to wait for a long time without knowing what is happening. I seek some reassurance from the Minister about how that will be managed through the Department.

[David Rutley]

As the hon. Lady says, we need an appeals process. It must be efficient—we do not want logjams—and the relevant bodies must be fully sighted of the appeals so that they can spot any trends that look odd and take appropriate action. The design is very important. The process will be established before the Bill is commenced.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Order. This is a debate, rather than a question and answer session, so it would be helpful for the Committee to get full and comprehensive answers, which are hopefully being inspired as we speak. I will call the shadow Minister, so that inspiration has a little bit more time.

[Sue Hayman]

We are trying to understand the process of how the appeals are working and, if an application is refused, how that appeals system will work, and whether people who have had an application refused will be advised to put in an appeal against that specific application or whether it is more practicable to start afresh and put in a new application. If it is a new application, to my mind, it is not an appeal to the previous application. We need to get that differentiation absolutely clear, as to the spirit of what the Bill is trying to achieve and the meaning of the terminology.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for filling that time, which shows true co-operation. We are trying to get answers to these questions on both sides. I really appreciate that. I will try one more time to explain the process. Forgive me if I have not been as clear as I should have been. Initially an individual or the owner makes an application, which is refused. The appeal is then considered by a separate new assessor once. Separately, an owner may make a new application and pay the fee again, but after the appeal has been heard.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 5 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 6

Pre-1918 portrait miniatures

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment 5, in clause 6, page 5, line 6, at end insert—

‘(1A) In this section, “portrait miniature” means a portable portrait that is—

(a) of no more than 204mm in height,

(b) of no more than 153mm in width, and

(c) made by painting on to a sheet of ivory no more than 5mm thick.’

This amendment defines a ‘portrait miniature’ for the purpose of the exemption.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss clause stand part.

[Sue Hayman]

The purpose of the amendment is to address a specific issue that has come up clearly in both the written evidence and the oral evidence we heard on Tuesday. A expert from Philip Mould & Company came to speak to us about portrait miniatures, because they are such a specific form of art that separate consideration is required.

Groups including the World Wildlife Fund and the International Fund for Animal Welfare, as well as museums and art galleries, were keen to get a proper definition and understanding of what kind of art works the Bill would affect. They asked for a size criterion in the definition of a portrait miniature, and the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire raised that during the evidence session because she knows it is needed to avoid confusion about exactly what a portrait miniature is. Compared with the picture at the back of this room, something the size of an A4 sheet of paper could be considered a portrait miniature.

It is important to get a clear definition in place, so that the exemption cannot be abused. The consultant on portrait miniatures from Philip Mould & Company suggested that we go for a maximum size of 6 inches wide by 8 inches high. She said that that would cover between 90% and 95% of all the portrait miniatures that she was aware of. In the amendment, we have converted that suggested measurement into millimetres and stated a maximum thickness. I understand that earlier portrait miniatures are slightly thicker than later ones, owing to the technology used to slice the ivory. On the basis that we are now a metric country, even though personally I would much rather deal with inches—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] If the Minister accepts the amendment, I would be happy for him to turn millimetres into inches, but because we are a metric country and my understanding is that these days our laws are made in metrics, not in feet and inches, we have converted the 8 inches by 6 inches into 204 mm by 153 mm.

[Alex Sobel]

On that generational point—[Interruption.] I am sure that my hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State will forgive me, as I am reinforcing her point.

[Sue Hayman]

I thought you were going to say my “age”!

[Alex Sobel]

No, no—the point is about metric against imperial measures. Parliament first debated metrification in 1818, which is the period when many portrait miniatures were created. We finally had Government policy agreeing metrification in 1965, but as we know, it was not fully implemented in shops until 2009. We should not be looking here at the same sort of timescale to get metric measures for ivory portrait miniatures. Doing that here and now would be much simpler than wrangling over it for the next 200 years.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving us the benefit of his extraordinary knowledge and wonder whether he has thought about joining the V&A staff in the future.

[Simon Hoare]

Does the hon. Lady have a legitimate expectation that that exchange might be heard on the wireless tomorrow?

[Sue Hayman]

It may be, as the hon. Gentleman’s previous very kind comments may be. One never knows.

I hope that the Minister will accept the amendment, because it would not change the focus of or detract from anything in the Bill. All it would do is provide clarification, the need for which I thought was universally accepted when we were taking evidence.

[Anna Turley]

I agree with my hon. Friend. Earlier this week, we heard powerful evidence that the sizes are pretty similar, pretty standard. The amendment would cover 90% to 95% of portrait miniatures. The witness we heard went so far as to say that putting this in the Bill was “very sensible”. That is a direct quote, and it is high praise indeed for some of our legislation to be described as sensible. I think that this provision is the way forward. It is very difficult to see any objection to having it in the Bill.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. She is right: the expert said that this would be a “very sensible” thing to do. I hope that the Minister recognises that the amendment is designed to support the Bill by making it generally more effective and giving owners of items a better understanding of exactly what kind of exemption certificate they should apply for, so that the process can move forward much more smoothly.

[Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

I endorse what the hon. Lady has said. It was clear in the evidence that a measurement was wanted. The whole point about the Bill is that we need clarity and absolute certainty so that everyone knows exactly where they stand. If an item were bigger than is suggested, it would not be considered a miniature, because a miniature is something small. Whether the measurements are in inches or millimetres, I do not mind, although like the hon. Lady, I do not really understand millimetres; I only understand inches. I am interested in what my hon. Friend the Minister has to say, but whether it is stated in the Bill or set out elsewhere as guidance, I would like the size to be specified if possible.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

Perhaps finishing the point I am trying to make will clarify the matter for the hon. Lady, and I will then go on to the point about the frames. I am grateful for the amendment, and I also note the helpful detail from Philip Mould & Company given during the evidence session. We will continue to consider this issue fully.

[Sue Hayman]

I appreciate the Minister’s response, but to be honest I felt that this was a pretty straightforward thing that we could move ahead with. There did not seem to be any disagreement at all. Philip Mould & Company is the expert in portrait miniatures. Emma Rutherford brought some along to show to us, and she was pretty clear on the definition. The amendment would be an extremely helpful addition to the Bill and I do not really understand why the Government will not consider it.

[David Rutley]

I assure the hon. Lady that the Government will give it full consideration, as I said. This is one point in the Bill’s passage. We will give full consideration to what has been said in Committee today and in the evidence sessions.

[David Rutley]

We will give that full consideration. I understand the point that hon. Members have made, that including a definition would add greater clarity. We will make that definition as clear as possible. However, as I have said several times now, the point has been made very clearly by Members on both sides of the Committee and we will give it full consideration.

[Sue Hayman]

Will the Minister expand on what he means by “give consideration”? I am sorry to push this, but I really think it would be helpful to have a definition in the Bill.

[David Rutley]

I understand that the hon. Lady’s enthusiasm knows no bounds; she is very passionate, as we all are, but I think she understands that there are formal processes that need to be gone through as part of the legislative process, and there will be moments at which these points can be given full consideration as the Bill progresses over the next few weeks.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I hope I have provided some reassurance to Members on both sides of the Committee that we are taking the matter seriously. I have never said that we are giving something serious consideration as often as I have in the past couple of minutes, and clearly my voice and tone are not as reassuring to people as they should be, but in the spirit of what we are trying to achieve, I hope that Members understand that important points were made in evidence, and there are processes that need to be undergone. Members have made important points in Committee about ifs, buts and maybes, and they need to be worked through, but I make a commitment that we shall give the matter proper consideration, with the right expertise, and move forward as quickly as we can. I hope that reassures Members on both sides.

I did not realise that there was so much interest in portrait miniatures until we got involved with the Bill.

[Sue Hayman]

I think the reason there is quite a lot of interest is partly that Emma Rutherford, the consultant, brought along such beautiful examples of portrait miniatures, but partly that it seemed to be a straightforward, easy thing on which we could all agree. I think that is why there has been such interest. I must say I am reluctant to let this go.

[David Rutley]

I understand the hon. Lady’s frustration to some extent, but having been asked to come off the substitutes bench to act as a Minister for a few weeks, I am learning that processes need to be put in place to ensure that various regulations and laws are respected and due process is followed before any changes are made. That is the point I am trying to make, perhaps not as elegantly as I should, but I hope that reassures her.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sue Hayman]

With reference to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East about looking at the implications of size, will the Minister undertake to work with me to take the matter forward and to table an amendment for consideration on Report, so we have that clarification in the Bill?

[David Rutley]

That is an excellent suggestion, and I look forward to working with the hon. Lady in the spirit of co-operation that we have seen today, to see how we can move it forward.

[Sue Hayman]

On the understanding that we will work together and table an amendment to clarify that area on Report, I am happy to beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 7

Pre-1947 items with low ivory content

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[David Rutley]

Clause 7 sets out the second exemption under the Bill. Subsections (1) and (2) state that items made before 1947 in which the ivory content is below 10% of the total volume of the item and the ivory is integral to the item, so it cannot be removed without damaging it or without difficulty, are exempt from the prohibition of sales, provided they are registered under clause 10.

The 1947 date for de minimis items derives from the EU wildlife trade regulations as the date before which worked ivory does not currently need a CITES—convention on international trade in endangered species—certificate to be commercially traded, and is familiar to those in the antiques sector. That familiarity will aid the ban’s implementation.

The exemption recognises that items with a very low ivory content, such as inlaid furniture, or a dish or a teapot with a small ivory handle, are not valued on the basis of their ivory content. Further, in such pieces, the ivory is incidental and integral to the item. It cannot be easily removed, so it is not vulnerable to recarving. The threshold of 10% ivory content is higher than in a significant number of countries. At federal level, the US has a 50% by volume limit or 200 grams threshold for de minimis exemption, although some states, such as New York and California, have implemented tougher thresholds.

The de minimis threshold is supported by key non-governmental organisations, including the World Wildlife Fund, the Tusk Trust and International Fund for Animal Welfare, which recognise it as a tough measure. Enforcement agencies have also indicated their gratitude that we have opted for a volume rather than a weight-based threshold, as it is far easier to assess.

Ordered, That the debate be now adjourned.—(Mims Davies.)

Ivory Bill (Fourth sitting)

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Committee Debate: 4th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 14th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

Question (this day) again proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

The Opposition are quite happy with clause 7, which relates to pre-1947 items with low ivory content. Concerns were raised in evidence, both written and oral, by some members of the art world that the 10% volume could be problematic. We saw a silver teapot with quite a large ivory handle, and there were concerns that that could fall foul of that exemption and that removing the handle would cause irreparable damage to the artefact. My understanding is that the measure encompasses most items that fall into this category, but it would be interesting to hear from the Minister any comments that were made following the oral evidence we heard on Tuesday from art experts.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

I want to make a few remarks about clause 7, and I do so having in mind the views of some small-scale auction houses that have raised concerns with me. The concerns are intended to be constructive, and I recognise that there are important competing arguments, but the question is whether it is really necessary to require the registration of pre-1947 items with low ivory content. The concern has been raised that that could lead, however unintentionally, to the law of unintended consequences such that a clause that was designed to preserve and exempt could inadvertently lead to damage and destruction, and I will explain why.

The first thing to note is, of course, that clause 7 is designed to catch items with a low ivory content of below 10%. I am advised that 10% is in fact the lowest or equal lowest figure in similar jurisdictions and that ordinarily 20% tends to be the threshold.

What sort of items are we talking about? We might be talking about an oak chest that has ivory escutcheons—the small amount of ivory that might be around a keyhole—or a teapot, which the hon. Member for Workington referred to, that has an ivory spacer. In other words, there is a small sliver of ivory between the teapot and the handle that is designed to insulate the handle and ensure that the heat is not conducted along it. We are talking about very small amounts of ivory. Such items cannot sensibly be referred to as an ivory object, because the volume of ivory is so tiny.

The auction houses make the point that these items do not really contribute to the ivory trade. I will explain their concern. Let us suppose that items come to light in the course of the sale of a deceased relation’s property and it emerges that one item contains a vanishingly small amount of ivory. Their concern is that there could be a perverse incentive on the part of the owner to say, “Oh, for goodness’ sake, registering this is going to be onerous and difficult. Either we should simply try to prise out the piece of ivory, thereby damaging the item itself, or we should destroy it altogether.” I am also advised that some of the items that we could be considering are brown wood furniture, which is not as desirable as it once was, and therefore there is a risk that the items could end up in a skip, which is clearly not want anyone wants to achieve.

I absolutely recognise that there is a powerful counter-argument, which is that if we want the whole exemption regime to be coherent, it is important that every single ivory content item that is exempt is properly registered, and there is a risk, therefore, that we could create inconsistency. I entirely acknowledge that powerful argument, but it seems to me that the auction houses have a point, so I invite my hon. Friend the Minister to comment on the issue of registration.

It is key that we ensure that the registration process is quick, affordable and not too bureaucratic, so that when an item is discovered in the course of a furniture sale, instead of being told that it will cost a huge amount of money and time to defer the process, an individual can be advised that it will be a matter of a short, proportionate pause and a small, proportionate outlay to ensure that the item becomes legal. The undesirable incentives that I have referred to would, therefore, be avoided.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

It will be a relatively speedy process. On the cost, we have said that small fees will be involved. That will become clear as we carry out the work. The aim is to recover the costs involved in establishing the IT system and the compliance arrangements, rather than to create surplus funds. The fees will be small and the process will be as simple as possible, but it is there to create a consistent approach.

[Sue Hayman]

I have a small comment about the points made by the hon. Member for Cheltenham. In relation to the fairness and openness of what we are trying to achieve, keeping the exemptions as small and as tight as possible is important, and we would support that. The enforcement officers we heard from on Tuesday made it clear that they would want as few exemptions as possible in order to do their job successfully.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady and, once again, we strongly agree on the same point. We are saying that the exemptions need to be robust, and my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham is saying that they also need to be proportionate. I think we have the balance right.

It is also important to reiterate to my hon. Friend that although people may want to sell some of those items, and we are putting a ban in place to make that more difficult, they can be gifted or donated to other people who might appreciate or have space for them. Certain charities might benefit, but the items would not be for resale. Gifts and donations are fine. We just have to look again at the way we treat ivory. This involves a cultural change for some people. We are all on a journey and the measure will help in that regard.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 7 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 8

Pre-1975 musical instruments

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[David Rutley]

The clause exempts from the prohibition of commercial dealing certain musical instruments containing ivory. Subsection (1) sets out that if a musical instrument is made before 1975 and less than 20% of it contains ivory, the item will be exempt, provided that it is registered as set out in the Bill, from the prohibition of the trade of ivory in the UK.

Subsection 2(a) defines a musical instrument as an item whose primary purpose is to be played as a musical instrument. It explicitly excludes items that, although they may technically be used as an instrument—in other words, they could produce a sound or be used to beat a rhythm—that was not their primary purpose on manufacture. That also extends to items intended as ornaments.

Subsection 2(b) confirms that items used as an accessory to play a musical instrument, such as a violin bow, are within the definition of the clause. The exemption recognises that musical instruments, particularly expensive ones, continued to be made with ivory until late into the 20th century. As the Government have no intention to unduly affect artistic and cultural heritage, nor to unduly affect the livelihoods of professional musicians, the exemption extends on the general de minimis exemption.

We heard from the musicians sector about the significant value of some instruments and the role they play in professional musicians’ retirement plans. The backstop date at which Asian elephants were first listed under appendix I of CITES was 1975, before the poaching crisis of the 1980s. Evidence provided through the consultation, including from the Musicians Union, showed that the vast majority of commonly played and traded instruments, including violins, pianos and bagpipes, contain 20% ivory or less by volume.

[Sue Hayman]

The evidence we took on Tuesday from musicians was interesting. They supported and broadly agreed with the measure, and were pleased with the exemptions because they will allow them to continue to work as musicians, whether professional or amateur. It was particularly interesting, however, to hear them say that they have had to deal most recently with the rosewood legislation, which CITES brought in last year. Rosewood is a protected species and that has had a big knock-on effect on the music industry because of the number of instruments made from rosewood.

The musicians said that that legislation had resulted in them having to fund a large education programme for their members and the wider music industry, so that the music industry understood that rosewood was now a protected product. They said that the legislation has had a large impact on the music industry, both in manufacturing and in buying and selling. I raise the issue because they said that it has been a really big challenge for them. Although they welcome and support the Ivory Bill, it would also create similar challenges, as they would have to do a fairly large education programme right across the industry—all sorts of people have musical instruments and many people have very old instruments, which might be in their attic—just to get that understanding across.

Education was discussed on a number of occasions in the evidence sessions. What kind of educational support programmes and guidance are the Government considering in relation to the Bill? Are they seeking to work in particular with industries, such as the Musicians Union, to get that information across to its members? Otherwise, it is a huge burden on them to do it on their own.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

In the scheme of what we are debating, it certainly is a small item. However, for those involved, it may be significant. My hon. Friend is absolutely right: if it is made of elephant ivory, it does not comply. However—we will debate mammoths at length when we debate clause 35, I am sure—mammoth ivory is not in the scope of the Bill as it stands, and therefore a plectrum will not be affected if it is made of mammoth ivory.

[Sue Hayman]

I will ask the Minister for a couple of clarifications; these may be covered in the Bill, but I am flicking backwards and forwards. First, the Minister mentioned the new regulator when talking about education and information. Are the Government saying that the new regulator will have a duty to educate and inform the affected industries? Just so I am clear, how will it work with the Department? If the Government have not decided, that is fine; I just want to know where we are.

Secondly, although this may well be covered in the Bill, I want to return to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East about certifications when going abroad for repairs. If someone has sent an instrument abroad for repair, not having realised that they should have registered it—which is obviously one concern of the Musicians’ Union—and is told that they cannot bring the instrument back into the country, will there be a method whereby they can apply for that certification in order to bring that instrument over? I am just trying to get clarity, so that I know exactly where we are on those particular issues.

[David Rutley]

The OPSS will have a role in driving awareness. However, we clearly need to work through how it will carry out that task. Lessons will need to be learned from the rosewood example and other situations.

It is exciting that people generally are clearly learning very quickly about plastics, and we need to capture some of that enthusiasm in the same way on ivory. I think that will be quite straightforward for some people, but for those who are unaware that their item has any ivory in at all, more work will need to be done. That is what the OPSS will do. The exact detail of that will be drawn up with the action plans. The decision that the OPSS will be the regulator is very recent, so there is clearly a lot more work to be done on that point. On the point about people not being aware of an item’s containing ivory, I will write to the hon. Lady to provide some clarity.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 8 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 9

Acquisitions by qualifying museums

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to move amendment 6, in clause 9, page 5, line 31, leave out from “that” to end of line 33.

This amendment would only permit acquisitions by qualifying museums to be exempt if the item is also registered under section 10, in all circumstances.

We tabled the amendment because we felt that clause 9(2)(a), which relates to acquisitions by qualifying museums, was also covered under clause 10 in all circumstances. The issue is whether paragraph (a) is strictly necessary. Surely all ivory items will be registered under clause 10, if they are held by a qualifying museum. I am just trying to join up clauses 9 and 10 logically, but I may have missed the reason why the provision is in the Bill. We would like clarification of what otherwise seems to be unnecessary confusion. Will the Minister enlighten us?

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for her careful consideration of the issue. I understand her desire to ensure tight control over exemptions. The intention of the clause is to provide for an exemption to the prohibition on dealings in ivory to and between qualifying museums. There is a strong argument for allowing the exemption on the grounds of national and international cultural exchange of heritage.

There is some doubt as to whether the amendment would achieve its stated intention. Were it to be accepted, the effect would be for qualifying museums to have to register items of ivory in every circumstance and to deal only in items meeting one of the other exemptions. The amendment would in effect remove the museum exemption. That is neither our intention, nor what we have set out publicly.

We should bear in mind that a qualifying museum is one accredited by either the Arts Council England, the Welsh Government, Museums Galleries Scotland or the Northern Ireland Museums Council. For museums elsewhere, they must be a member organisation of the International Council of Museums. Accreditation by those bodies requires adherence to high standards of governance and financial management and, as we heard in evidence, high ethical standards.

To require registration by qualifying museums in all circumstances would undermine the reasons for providing qualifying museums with an exemption and be a disproportionate burden, particularly as we do not believe the exemption is likely to contribute to continuing poaching of elephants. We intend, however, that a person seeking to sell an item to an accredited museum will be required to register it. The purchasing museum will be required to confirm its purchase.

With that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[Sue Hayman]

I am not entirely sure what kinds of items are covered. Surely any exempted item is covered by clause 10. I am trying to understand what items we are considering.

[David Rutley]

I understand the hon. Lady’s point. We are trying to be very narrow in our approach. An example that might be useful—it certainly helped me to understand this case—is a museum that wanted to have a household object for a display on social history. The item has direct relevance to a period of time in a social history exhibition, so it would not qualify under the other exemptions we have discussed, if it is more modern, but it would still be directly relevant to the museum’s exhibition.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for that extremely helpful explanation. Basically, he is talking about items that would not come under the exemptions because they are not the rarest and most sought after, but are important items in the context of an exhibition. That would be allowed to take place only within the confines of a museum; it could not take place universally.

[David Rutley]

Let me give another example to make it come alive a bit more. We heard from the Victoria and Albert Museum that a post-1918 item made wholly of ivory, such as an art deco item, which would not be exempt elsewhere, might be relevant for a particular display, in terms of culture and heritage. Of course, that would have to take place in line with the museum’s very strict acquisition processes.

Without seeking to become an expert in how museums acquire these things, I think that it was clear from our evidence session that they have very strict approaches, which would still be in place. This is a discreet exemption for museums because they are held to higher standards. They are regulated in a different way, and are subject to restrictions that do not apply to other holders and owners of ivory. We need to make sure that there are regulation processes outwith museums, but museums are required to work at very high standards.

Because there might be some items that sit outwith the exemptions we have broadly agreed upon, we want to continue to have the exemption for museums. There is a danger that the wording of the amendment would nullify the museums category. I hope that the hon. Lady will see that it would be wise to withdraw the amendment. We can discuss the matter more outside the Committee if that is required.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for that explanation. We are all aware that this is a complex Bill, and the exemptions are even more complex. It is important that we get this right and that there is a proper understanding of the purpose of each clause. I fully understand that explanation, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 9 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 10

Registration

Amendment proposed: 7, in clause 10, page 6, line 34, at end insert—

‘(1A) In the case an exemption under section 7 or 8, an item only satisfies the relevant exemption conditions if the volume of ivory in the item relative to the total volume of the material of which the item is made has been calculated in accordance with a method provided in guidance by the Secretary of State.’—(Sue Hayman.)

This amendment requires a person registered an pre-1947 item with less than 10% ivory content, or a pre-1975 musical instrument with less than 20% ivory content, to calculate the ivory content according to a method set by the Secretary of State in guidance.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Clause stand part.

New clause 4—Record of item provenance—

‘(1) The Secretary of State shall make arrangements for persons—

(a) applying for an exemption certificate under section 3, or

(b) registering an item under section 10 to be able to associate the item to which the application or registration relates with previous registrations or previously issued exemption certificates.

(2) Where an exemption certificate is issued in respect of an item, or where an item has been previously registered, and the Secretary of State is satisfied that the item has previously been registered or had exemption certificates issued in respect of it, the exemption certificate or registration shall record all previous exemption certificates issued or registrations made in respect of that item, including the dates on which any certificates were issued or registrations made.’

This new clause allows for exemption certificates or registrations to record all previous exemption certificates or registrations issued for that item, in order to establish a record of each item’s ownership and provenance.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

Returning to the clause, registration will require an explanation of any planned commercial activity for the item. We recognise that there might be occasions when an item is registered for non-commercial reasons, such as to satisfy insurance requirements. Subsection (1)(f) provides for the Secretary of State to specify, in guidance, any other areas of information that must be provided.

Subsection (1)(g) allows the Secretary of State to issue regulations that will prescribe a fee payable by those registering an item for commercial dealing, such as sale. The fee will be in line with the Government’s principle of cost recovery, as we talked about earlier, to reflect the cost of establishing the registration scheme, including the new IT system.

We also intend the registration scheme to apply to those who wish to import into the UK items bought abroad that meet one of the categories of exemption. Again, we have talked about some of those, such as the musical instrument exemption. By registering the item, the owner will confirm that, to their understanding, the item qualifies under the relevant exemption. This registration must take place prior to the dealing of that item. The system will be administered by the Animal and Plant Health Agency.

In submitting the required information to register an item, the owner will in effect be making a declaration that the item is as they have described. Subject to the requirements of the registration process being fulfilled, confirmation of the registration of the ivory item will be issued, which will permit the owner to engage in dealing with that specific item. Should it transpire, as a result of either a check of the system by the Secretary of State or compliance and enforcement activity by the regulator or police, that the information does not match the item in question, the owner may be liable to prosecution.

I thank the hon. Member for Workington for tabling new clause 4. I think we all agree that we need to make the process as transparent and open as possible. As we discussed in relation to new clause 1, the Government intend to publish the number of exemption certificates issued. I appreciate the intention behind the new clause, which is that the Government should be able to build up a clear picture of the movement of items exempted under clause 2 as they are bought and sold, and of items registered for exemption under clause 10. I should clarify that an exemption certificate will be associated not with a person, but with the relevant item—we touched on that earlier in the debate. A registration, on the other hand, will be valid for only one commercial dealing resulting in a change of ownership—that is, a sale. Once an item has changed hands, the registration expires.

We need to ensure the right to privacy of owners and sellers, in line with the Data Protection Act 2018. We therefore doubt whether it would be permissible to list a current or previous owner’s name on either exemption certificates or registration certificates, as they might be displayed publicly by the seller, or by someone acting on behalf of the seller. In the case of exemption certificates, they will also be required to be passed on to the purchaser.

We are looking at the possibility of publishing data annually on the types of items exempted under each category—for instance, how many pianos are registered under the musical instruments category. Again, the publication of any further detail will have to be considered in line with the Data Protection Act, in order to ensure the right to privacy of owners and sellers. We talked about some of these tensions in the earlier debate.

In addition, law enforcement agencies and the regulatory authority will have access to the database for registration, so they will be aware if previous applications have been made in respect of an exemption certificate under clause 3 or a registration under clause 10.

[Sue Hayman]

In amendment 7 we are looking at an item that has been exempted under clause 7 or clause 8. The item would then only satisfy the relevant exemption conditions,

“if the volume of ivory in the item relative to the total volume of the material of which the item is made has been calculated in accordance with a method provided in guidance by the Secretary of State.”

The amendment requires anyone registering a

“pre-1947 item with less than 10% ivory…or a pre-1975 musical instrument with less than 20%”,

to calculate the ivory to a set, prescribed methodology.

We looked at tabling this amendment following the oral evidence we took on Tuesday from the Chairman of the British Art Market Federation. I asked a question about volume and measurement and how that would work, and his concern was that there could be discrepancies in the way that volume was measured. There was a clear appreciation of the fact that measuring by volume is the right way to move forward; it is much more practical than measuring by weight. If we are going to measure by volume, it would be helpful to have a clear and consistent method of calculation so that nobody accidentally falls into criminality because they use a system of measurement that is not recognised by the Secretary of State. We just seek to provide clarity to the music and art world, and to museums, that, “This is the prescribed method, and we expect you to use this system if you are to get your certification.”

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for the amendment, but I believe that it would add an unnecessary and disproportionate requirement to the registration process. The clause establishes the compliance regime that must be followed by the owner of an ivory item who wishes to deal in that item under any one of the exemptions. The registration process already requires a description of the item and a photograph to confirm the distinguishing features. From responses to the consultation, we understand that the majority of commonly played and traded musical instruments and accessories, such as pianos and violin bows, are less than 20% ivory. We also believe from the evidence we have received that it is reasonably easy to assess with the naked eye whether an item is 10% or less ivory by volume. Indeed, we believe that it is easier to assess against a 10% threshold than, for instance, a 30% threshold.

Anyone who registers an ivory item will have confirmed to the best of their knowledge that the item in question meets the relevant category of exemption, and will have submitted information or evidence about it—photographs, for example. Spot checks will be carried out on registered items by enforcement and compliance officers to confirm that they are exempt from our ban. If an item is being used commercially, regulators or the police may check to confirm that it is registered and compliant, and may take appropriate action if necessary. Given that explanation, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna Turley]

I rise to speak to new clause 4. I want to express my concern about resources. What we heard in evidence this week gave me serious cause for concern. I was shocked that the CITES Border Force team at Heathrow has only 10 people and that the National Wildlife Crime Unit has only 12 people, given the existing scale of the problem, which I think was 1,000 seizures per year. They will have an awful lot of work to do when the Bill is in force.

This is not the place to make political points, but resources are critical to the Bill’s success and we all know the pressures there have been on police budgets in the current climate. It is therefore imperative that the relevant bodies have the resources they need to enforce this law, for it to have any value whatsoever.

[Sue Hayman]

New clause 4 would establish a record of any item’s provenance. Items to be exempted are, as we know, the most rare and most important of their kind. When such important items are sold, whether privately, individually or through an auction house for museums or galleries, their provenance would tend to move with them so that the purchaser has confidence that the item is genuine and knows who bought it before and where it has been stored or exhibited.

The idea is for the Secretary of State to make arrangements so that persons applying for an exemption certificate under clause 3 or registering an item under clause 10 could associate the item to which the application or registration relates with previous registrations or exemption certificates. Where an exemption certificate has previously been issued in respect of an item or an item has been previously registered and the Secretary of State is satisfied that that is the case, the exemption certificate would also record previous exemption certificates issued and registrations made in respect of that item. In particular, it would include relevant dates so that any certification or registration follows the item. The Minister has made it clear that registration is for the item, not the individual, so it makes sense for the history to move with the item as it goes through any future registrations or exemptions.

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State stressed the importance of ensuring that an item’s provenance can be guaranteed, and that is what the new clause tries to achieve. It would provide security for future owners, who would have full details of an item’s history in this area, as is normal for many items sold or within the art world. It would also helpfully flag up any replacement certification. It may also be helpful in trying to counteract any fraudulent behaviour regarding multiple replacement certificates. If those previous certifications followed the item, it would be very clear if there was a particular item for which a number of replacement certificates were being requested. I ask the Minister to consider the value the new clause could bring to future owners of the items we are talking about.

[David Rutley]

There are a few items. We are going in a slightly different order, but we are going with it, in the spirit of the Bill. We are getting through it and I appreciate the co-operation.

[Sue Hayman]

We have to be nimble.

[David Rutley]

We are. We are fleet of foot, that is for sure. Some of the questions are quite interesting.

As we are talking about lots of different issues at this point, I want to go back to the comments from the hon. Member for Leeds North West, to bring it together. The musicians sector has said that it is broadly happy with the 20% exemption. Particularly for pianos, the vast majority are definitely going to fall within that exemption, so that will be fine. The US has a different arrangement, but our enforcement bodies were very clear that they did not want a weight measure. It just made it more difficult. Just so we are all clear, the US body is called the US Fish and Wildlife Service—I thank my officials for that.

A very good point was raised about resources. Obviously, public finances are always under scrutiny and we need to make sure that they are being best used. The National Wildlife Crime Unit is jointly funded by the Home Office and DEFRA and will be funded up to 2020, and there are ongoing conversations about that. Future funding decisions about such bodies will be for the Home Office, and the Home Secretary has said he is working on those matters. We should also not forget that we have the regulator involved.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

If I can ask Ms Hayman to be quite nimble, I will take her back to amendment 7. Does she want to press it to a vote or is she seeking to withdraw it?

[Sue Hayman]

I will just think about that.

[David Rutley]

While the hon. Lady thinks about it, perhaps I can explain that although our approach will require resources, it will also require online tools so that we can have a proper registration and certification process in place. I do not know whether that has given the hon. Lady enough time to revisit the amendment.

[Sue Hayman]

Yes, it has—I thank the Minister for his support on that. On the total volume, as long as the guidance that is provided to support the Bill once it has become law is clear about support for individuals who are assessing the volume of their items, and that any accidental criminality, owing to people falling on the wrong side slightly of the volume calculation, is avoided, I will withdraw the amendment. The guidance needs to be clear about the implications and the best way to find help and support. We are talking about musical instruments: people might not have any idea how to calculate this, so there needs to be proper access to people who can. It is important that that information is easily available so that people do not accidentally fall on the wrong side of the law. If the Minister can give me that reassurance, I will be happy to withdraw the amendment.

[David Rutley]

Yes, I can reassure the hon. Lady that proper guidance will be available. The enforcement agencies that we spoke to during the evidence sessions were committed to the volume-based approaches, and they seem able to move on. They did not query it when we met, so I can give her those assurances.

[Sue Hayman]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 10 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 11

Further provision about registration

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[David Rutley]

The clause is largely technical; it provides further information on the registration process and ensures that the Secretary of State has the necessary levers to ensure that the process works effectively and is not open to abuse or misuse. Subsection (1) ensures that the registration of an item would cease to be valid as soon as its owner changes. Unlike the exemption certificate issued for items under the rarest and most important category, registration allows the current owner either to sell their item or to engage in other forms of dealing that do not result in change of ownership, such as hiring the item. The registration is therefore associated with the individual and is valid for a single change of ownership. It is different from certification.

The owner must register an item in order to carry out dealings but does not need to register an item each time a commercial dealing is undertaken, as long as the owner does not change. For example, if the owner wishes to hire the item multiple times, they complete a single registration for the item to be subject to hire. If the owner changes, however, the registration becomes invalid and the item must be registered by the new owner before they can carry out any dealing. This applies to individuals and organisations.

Subsection (2) sets out that once the owner registers an item under clause 10, they have a responsibility to ensure that the information recorded in the registration process remains complete and accurate. As such, if the owner becomes aware that information included in the application is inaccurate or incomplete, or if any information becomes invalid or changes, they must notify the Secretary of State and provide the required information to address the issue. That could be, for example, because the item is damaged or otherwise altered at some time after registration but before dealing, or if the owner, having completed the registration process, subsequently becomes aware of some fact that might invalidate the registration. If an owner were found to be in possession of such information and had not informed the Secretary of State, they could be found to be in breach of the provision.

--- Later in debate ---

Subsection (6) clarifies the meaning of terms used in the clause, including with reference to other clauses in the Bill.

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister and congratulate him on getting through that. I find this clause complex. I worry that existing and future owners might get confused about what is expected of them and when it is expected. Again, clear guidance will be incredibly important. The explanatory notes state:

“If a new owner wishes to carry out dealings in that ivory item, they must make a fresh registration”—

but a fresh registration from what? Is that fresh from the exemption certificate or an existing registration? I find that slightly confusing.

[David Rutley]

In the interests of clarification, it is important to note that certificates are required for the rarest and most important items. The certificate is in a way a passport that goes along with the items, because they are particularly rare, important and often valuable. The certificate acts a bit like a passport, moving on with the item.

The other categories are covered by the registration process. Notwithstanding the fact that I have learned through this process that some musicians have valuable items, often such items are not that valuable. In this approach, therefore, we have a registration process that is more simple and straightforward, with lower cost—this is about cost recovery from applying through an online system. Applying for a certificate will be a more costly approach, because of what we talked about this morning—where the Secretary of State is required to get advice from another body. The idea is that certificates are for the rare and most important items, and a more simple, low-cost registration approach is for all the other exemptions that we have discussed so far. I hope that clarifies matters.

[Sue Hayman]

Yes, it does. I am thinking about the comparison with car registration that my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East used earlier. The language is complex, but it would be good if it were absolutely crystal clear where the responsibility lies, and when in respect of registering items. If that is not clear in the Bill, or if I have missed it, how can we make it obvious to any purchaser or seller so that people do not accidently fall foul of the law?

[David Rutley]

I agree that the provision can sound complicated. I have tried to explain as best I can how it will move forward. The key thing is that registration is the lighter touch when compared with certification. People who have an item and want to ensure that everything is all right can use the registration system online, and there are telephone and postal arrangements for those who are not tech-savvy.

We need to ensure that we have a robust system and should remember that we are trying to stop the use of ivory. That is the balance we are trying to strike; we want something that is both robust and proportionate. Registration for those other categories is more proportionate but will enable us to ensure that the measures are properly complied with.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sue Hayman]

I thank the Minister for his response. I support the idea that the Bill needs to be robust—if it is not, we will not achieve the desired ends. Registration will affect many more people than the exemption certificates, so it is important that when the Bill becomes law there is an absolutely clear understanding of what is expected of people and the deadlines.

[David Rutley]

I thank the hon. Lady for those further points. The responsibility will be very much with the owner—we are putting the onus on the owner—which is why we need to ensure that the system is clear. We will be working hard to ensure that it is an easy-to-use and clear system. We now have several months in which to get the provisions in place. We need to get moving to Royal Assent, but then there will be a six-month period when we can get ready for when it is put into practice.

We are moving at pace and want more pace, but at the same time we need to ensure that the systems are right. We are working behind the scenes with officials and various other bodies to ensure that there is clear guidance and that the systems, once established—we are still developing them—are fit for purpose and easy to use.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 11 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Mims Davies.)

Ivory Bill (First sitting)

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 12th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

We will now hear evidence from the World Wide Fund for Nature, Born Free and the International Fund for Animal Welfare. Before I call the first Member to ask a question, I remind Members that questions should be limited to matters within the scope of the Bill, and that we must stick to the timings of the programme motion. Could the witnesses introduce themselves for the record and to check the sound?

Cath Lawson: My name is Cath Lawson, I am the chief adviser on wildlife at WWF UK.

Will Travers: My name is Will Travers, I am the president of the Born Free Foundation.

David Cowdrey: My name is David Cowdrey, I am the head of policy and campaigns at the International Fund for Animal Welfare.

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

Q Do you all feel that the scope of the Bill, about just elephant ivory, is broad enough? If we ban just elephant ivory, could there be a shift towards ivory and horn from other animals being targeted? If it is possible, should we broaden the scope of the Bill to prevent that from happening?

Will Travers: That is an important question. Context is important; we all feel that it is important that whatever other considerations there are for non-elephant ivory-bearing species, they do not blow this legislation off course or delay it significantly. We all share the view that it would be a tragedy, to put it in informal terms, if we worked really hard to save elephants and other species were collateral damage in the process. But we need to consider a number of species.

We suggest that the Government commit to a rapid consultation after the Bill, to look at hippos, narwhal, hornbill—which are also facing extinction because their bills are a surrogate for ivory—walrus and not just CITES-listed species but non-CITES-listed species. We recognise that the trade—particularly the legal one—is entrepreneurial and will move to wherever there is an opportunity. Species such as warthog could come into the frame very rapidly as interest in ivory shifts from elephants, which are getting a huge amount of attention, to other ivory-bearing species.

In summary, we would like real attention to be paid to the issue, but we want to make sure that that does not in any way delay this process. That would be detrimental to what is under way.

Cath Lawson: We endorse that opinion. We are happy that the Bill as it stands, which allows for consideration of other ivory-bearing species at a later date, is sufficient. We would be comfortable with Will’s suggestion of expansion to non-CITES-listed species, too, but our concern would be that to include other non-ivory-bearing species at this point would cause delays to the Bill. With the illegal wildlife trade conference in October, we are keen that the Bill moves quickly through the legislative process.

David Cowdrey: Again, I endorse what WWF and Born Free just said. There should be flexibility in the Bill to include other species in future, but at this time the focus should be on delivering for elephant ivory, which the consultation was about and where a lot of the research was. That flexibility should enable the inclusion of further species should they be exploited and should there be a need to add them.

[Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

Q That is interesting because the Bill has been a long time coming and it is great that we have got this far. To knock it off course would be perverse. As we have not consulted on all the other species, would the best thing be to get the Bill through and then all of you who are experts could meet Ministers to decide which species—particulary non-CITES species—ought to be included so that we do not have other species coming on to the endangered list simply because activity has been displaced? I assume that you would all be happy to consult Ministers once the Bill is passed to get that done as soon as possible.

David Cowdrey: I totally agree with that. We have all worked so hard to get to this point to deliver one of the strongest ivory bans in the world. The initiative that has been taken by all parties and the cross-party support shown on Second Reading have been superb, and there is an opportunity to provide that protection. As we said, as long as there is that flexibility, and consideration for other species, which can be applied in future, and as long as further consultations can be held and we can have those discussions, I would agree totally with that.

Cath Lawson: Yes, WWF would be happy to engage in that consultation process, but for it to be separate to passing the Bill.

Will Travers: Just for the Committee’s interest and information, we are talking about huge volumes of trade in non-elephant ivory. I have four figures that might be helpful. From 2007 to 2016—just under a decade—78,000 hippos and hippo products were exported by CITES parties. Hong Kong imported 60 tonnes of hippo ivory between 2004 and 2014. Between 2007 and 2016—those dates again—7,000 narwhal products were exported and more than 172,000 walrus specimens were reported to have been exported on the CITES trade database. Those are not insignificant by any measure—they are enormously significant. With that kind of volume now, as we have just mentioned, the shift away from elephant ivory could put insupportable pressure on these other species, which is why we would like to see an accelerated process for that after this process has been undertaken. That is a very helpful suggestion.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Latham]

Q You mentioned Hong Kong and the fact that China is implementing this measure quite strictly. You also mentioned mammoth. I understand that in Hong Kong ivory is being passed off as mammoth tusk. Obviously the mammoth are dead—we are never going to save the life of a mammoth—but should we consult on a ban on mammoth ivory as well as on those species that might become extinct as a result of not being included in the Bill? If in Hong Kong, or anywhere else, people can say, “It’s all right; this is a mammoth tusk,” and sell it, does that not create the loophole that those who want to make money are looking for?

Cath Lawson: It is certainly something that we would be comfortable with. I mentioned an amendment earlier. At the moment the Bill includes CITES-listed species, but mammoth, as an extinct species, are not a CITES-listed species and never will be. One option would be to remove that caveat in the existing legislation, but that could be part of a later consultation process.

[Sue Hayman]

Q Let us come back to the scope of the meaning of ivory. You talked about there being a delay if anything is added in. Given that this is the Ivory Bill, not the Elephant Ivory Bill, and that the CITES list makes clear that there is concern about species beyond the elephant, why would there be a delay if you added in the species listed by CITES? The consultation allowed for discussion of other species that are badly affected by this issue, and you have the figures.

Cath Lawson: During the consultation process, we did not advocate for additional species to be added. Our advice in the consultation response was to focus on elephant ivory.

Will Travers: We did comment on other species, and we did advocate that there should be consideration, which is what I believe clause 35 refers to. The definition of ivory in the Bill is ivory from elephant species. I understand why it is important to make sure there is consideration of other species, for which there has been no full consultation. We want to understand what is going on with hippo ivory, with narwhal ivory, with walrus ivory, with warthog ivory—non-CITES listed—and with extinct, non-CITES-listed mammoth ivory. There may be—I am just trying to think of the right way of expressing this—specific exemptions that would have been considered for inclusion specific to, for example, mammoth ivory that we would be discussing now had that been part of the overall process to start with.

[Sue Hayman]

Q But if you were just looking at CITES species, you wouldn’t be including mammoth.

Will Travers: No, but we are rather hopeful that we don’t restrict ourselves to CITES species.

[Sue Hayman]

Q I am just talking about the Bill at the moment. It could be improved quickly by adding in the CITES species, as I know a number of people were suggesting. You could then consult and look at the non-CITES species and the issue of mammoths separately afterwards. My big concern is that you bring this in just for elephants and you very quickly see a shift. You could protect the other CITES species straightaway, without the need to go to consultation because of the nature of the Bill, being the Ivory Bill, if you see where I am coming from.

David Cowdrey: The built-in flexibility under clause 35(3), and the opportunity for the Secretary of State to add, means you would not need to go through a consultation process. If we were informing the Secretary of State of a shift that has taken place in conservation terms with species that are coming under threat, there should be an ability to provide that evidence for action to be taken swiftly to add those species immediately within the Bill. That flexibility currently exists under clause 35(3).

In relation to the speed of the Bill, I hand it back to you as hon. Members. That is in your remit—your court. As an NGO, we would like to see this Bill completed and into legislation by October, prior to the IWT conference, so we can have a global stage to announce this fantastic piece of legislation. So I hand the ball back to you.

[Simon Hoare]

Q I have two very quick points. The first is, having looked at Wikipedia—that great source of authority and information, as we all know—mammoths are included in the elephantidae family. I am rather anxious that what we are trying to do here is to decommoditise the attractiveness of ivory in all its forms and types. Therefore, I wonder whether mammoth is actually covered within the Bill, as set out in clause 35(6).

The other thing, very briefly, is whether you have had a look at the enforcement regulations, as set out in later clauses of the Bill. Do you think they are about right, too lenient or top-heavy?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

We will now hear oral evidence from Stop Ivory and the Tusk Trust. We have until 11.25 am for this panel. May I ask the witnesses to introduce themselves for the record?

Charlie Mayhew: My name is Charlie Mayhew. I am the chief executive of Tusk Trust.

Alexander Rhodes: My name is Alexander Rhodes. I am from Stop Ivory.

[Sue Hayman]

Q If the ban is purely on elephant ivory, do you think that will have a detrimental effect, with the trade being potentially pushed on to other species? What are your thoughts on that?

Charlie Mayhew: The short answer is yes. There must be a concern that the criminal syndicates that operate in this space might well be inclined to move to trade greater figures in hippo, mammoth, walrus and other ivory-carrying species. There certainly is that concern.

Alexander Rhodes: Of course, there is the risk that that will be a result of tightening controls on elephant ivory in this way. I feel strongly, however, that sending a clear message, as this does, on elephant ivory is critical at this time. Our colleagues have given the numbers beforehand. Particularly looking at the conference in October, the focus on elephants is very important. We are talking about trying to achieve a decrease in the killing of elephants by stopping ivory being traded. We must continue to focus strongly on the elephant ivory.

[Sue Hayman]

Q I see your point on that, but we do not want to see, as a consequence of that, the increased killing of other species.

Alexander Rhodes: Without a shadow of a doubt.

Charlie Mayhew: Absolutely. The public, in whichever part of the world, who ultimately buy ivory do not necessarily differentiate where that ivory has emanated from. We have an opportunity here, in introducing this legislation, which as people have previously said is one of the toughest bans in the world, to send a message that ivory should now be socially unacceptable. If we can try to use this legislation, particularly with the upcoming illegal wildlife trade conference and attendees coming from all over the world, the rest of the world should follow suit.

[Mrs Latham]

Q Going back to what I said to the previous panel about ivory tusk being traded as mammoth, which is quite legal and would be quite legal after this Bill came in, is that something that we should consult on? Clearly we will not save the life of a mammoth—they are all extinct—but would it continue to save the lives of elephants if we banned that? It is not on the CITES list that we have heard about, but do you think that such a measure would be helpful to prevent elephants from being targeted? If someone can legally pass a tusk off as mammoth tusk, it will not stop anything.

Alexander Rhodes: Yes. Perhaps as a bit of context around that, it is interesting to note that the crisis that was recognised just before the last London conference came about because of the professionalisation of poaching. Illegal organised crime stepped in and added elephant ivory to its inventory because there was no legal international trade and there was an opportunity. That took place in circumstances where, internationally, there was confusion, and there was no common position on whether elephant ivory should or should not be traded—that rift had been in place since 1989.

Over the four years since the London conference, strong consensus has been built internationally that the ivory market should be closed. Importantly, that has taken the form of two international resolutions, one at CITES and one at the IUCN, that domestic markets for ivory—that is what we are talking about—should close, as should some of the other leading markets for elephant ivory, such as those in China and the US, and we are looking forward, beyond there, into Europe. That certainty about the illegality of ivory has significantly changed in the price of ivory.

When we started looking at this issue at the time of the first London conference, many people said that closing markets for ivory was a stupid thing to do, because all it would do is drive up the price. They said that destroying stockpiles of ivory, or locking them up so that they could not be traded into the market, was a stupid thing to do, because it would just drive up the price, and that the more scarce you make things, the higher the price becomes. Interestingly, David mentioned prices earlier, and the change that we have seen during this period, and the effect of the measure, has been that, in China, the price of a kilo of ivory between the time of the last London conference and now has gone from $2,500 to $450. In some African countries there has been a similar collapse in the price of ivory paid to gunmen. That wider context goes to the point about clarity on the legality, or illegality, of ivory.

I tend to agree with what Charlie said, which is that if you say, “Ivory is banned”—this is called the Ivory Bill, and the basis on which it was built was a commitment to close ivory market—that is pretty clear, and it falls within the international consensus that has been built on elephant ivory. My personal view is that, yes, it would make great sense to expand the Bill to cover mammoth ivory and other types of ivory for species that are threatened as a result of this trade. Such a measure would disincentivise people from going and killing those animals, whether they are doing it cynically for their own profit or because it is the only choice they have on the table—that is possibly something else we may discuss.

The real question in my mind, however, is whether, if we start trying to expand the Bill now, we will lose the effect that we can get, and the UK’s role in that momentum, which is already making a massive change. I return to what David said, which is that this is perhaps more your area of expertise than ours, but I think that is the balance to strike.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liz Twist]

Q So you would like to see the Bill amended to reflect that?

Alexander Rhodes: Yes.

[Sue Hayman]

Q We have talked quite a bit about enforcement and implementation once the Bill is complete. There is so much potential for mis-selling and for misleading behaviour. We have talked about the internet. It is incredibly complicated. When this Bill becomes law, how fit is the judiciary to manage sentencing and stop this trade happening? Do we want guidelines attached to the Bill for the judiciary? Do we want training? What kind of sentencing do we need to stop it happening? I would be interested to get your thoughts on that.

Charlie Mayhew: Absolutely. As part of this Bill—I believe DEFRA is planning to do this anyway—we need a significant awareness programme, not only for the judiciary but for the general public. That is essential. Educating the public, the judiciary and the enforcement officers is absolutely essential.

We very much hope that, in the same vein that DEFRA has consulted us to date, it will be willing to consult us on the guidance notes. I fully endorse that. There is a desperately increasing need to educate the judiciary in African countries on enforcing the legislation against the illegal wildlife trade, poaching and so on. In some countries, they are more advanced than others. We see how important it is that the judiciary fully understands the scope of this Bill and how it is going to be enforced.

Alexander Rhodes: It is interesting that a number of the African countries that are members of the elephant protection initiative and others have been working hard with support from colleagues to develop prosecution and sentencing guidelines for wildlife crime, in particular in relation to the ivory trade.

[Sue Hayman]

Q Is that something we can learn from? Would it be relevant?

Alexander Rhodes: Really importantly, it is something we can learn from and it is quite good that we can learn from what African countries have been doing in relation to that. Interestingly, we paid for it anyway. In the context of Angola, for example, where we are working at the moment, a challenge fund grant is paying for a programme of legislative reform review and prosecutor and judicial training.

[Kerry McCarthy]

Q Returning to what you said about a ban on any sales online, would that apply just to pre-1918 items, and not to the exemptions for items with low ivory content? I am thinking particularly of musical instruments. At the moment there is an exemption for pre-1975 musical instruments. They are quite often bought and sold online. People buy guitars, for example, from online shops. Would you be happy for that to continue where the ivory is not a crucial part of the item but it happens to have ivory decoration, or an ivory mouthpiece, for example? I do not think many pianos are bought and sold online, but they can have ivory keys.

Alexander Rhodes: The purpose of this is clarity and certainty, so my preference would be for it to be straightforward. If it is ivory, you cannot sell it, and you cannot deal in it, online. To add a little context, you are right, of course. Not only are musical instruments with bits of ivory in them bought and sold online but some inlay furniture is also sometimes bought and sold online. However, it is the overwhelming minority of musical instruments or pieces of furniture that contain ivory of that kind.

My personal preference, for clarity and therefore for certainty, would be for it to apply across the piece. Of course, if it applied only to part of the piece, that would still be better certainty than its not applying at all.

Ivory Bill (Second sitting)

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 12th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

We will now hear oral evidence from the National Wildlife Crime Unit and the CITES Border Force team at Heathrow. We have until 2.15 pm for this third panel. The air conditioning does not appear to be working so well today, so if people want to take their jackets off, feel free to do so. For the record, will the witnesses introduce themselves?

Grant Miller: I am Grant Miller, senior officer with the Border Force based at Heathrow, leading the CITES team that enforces the UK’s obligation to the convention.

Chief Inspector Hubble: I am Chief Inspector Lou Hubble, head of the UK National Wildlife Crime Unit. We work with police forces throughout the UK, supporting them in enforcement. We also collate and disseminate intelligence throughout the UK and internationally in relation to wildlife trade.

[Sue Hayman (Workington) (Lab)]

Q 57 How do the two different roles that you have interact, and how do the two organisations work? How are your resources at the moment? Do you have sufficient resources should the Bill become law? Would you need any further training or resources, and what impact would that have on your current roles?

Grant Miller: Our roles are quite distinct, which allows us to work hand in glove. The Border Force role is to disrupt the illegal trade—import/export—and trans-shipment of ivory through the UK. Our focus is largely on the export of our historically held ivory, which is traded over online auction houses and is then shipped predominantly to China and Hong Kong, but there is an emerging market in Vietnam for those goods as well. Border Force no longer has an investigation function; we hand all our intelligence from investigations to the National Wildlife Crime Unit with a view to it investigating those offences. So they are very much clear roles that allow us to work in partnership.

With regard to resources in Border Force, we have a dedicated unit that has been established for 30 years now and a team that is regarded as probably one of the best in the world at enforcing controls against the illegal wildlife trade. It is a team of 10 staff with national responsibility. We are, however, supported by every other uniformed Border Force officer, who has a basic level of skill in being able to identify animal and plant products.

Like every law enforcement manager, we could always use more resources and could always deliver more. However, what a small, highly focused team with clear objectives gives us is an easily moveable unit to actually address the changing risk. It allows us to be a lot more dynamic in addressing the risk and very flexible in moving from postal to air to maritime environments. At the moment, against the Border Force control strategy, our resourcing is adequate to control the threat.

Chief Inspector Hubble: When Border Force makes seizures of items being exported from the UK, it passes that intelligence to us. We collate that intelligence, develop it and research it to look at the number of items that people might be buying, selling or trading. We look at their associates. We try to map a network of people that they are linked in with, and ultimately we produce an intelligence package that goes out to a police force in the area where the person is committing the offences.

We have four officers who provide an investigative function to support police forces on the ground, and they work with police officers throughout the investigation: taking statements from witnesses, linking in with experts, compiling prosecution files, assisting with search warrants, and attending court to provide evidence. Due to our limited resource, we have to be really selective in what we deal with, so the number of investigations that we get where people are trading at a lower level would generally be sent to local policing to deal with. As a national unit, our focus has to be on those who are trading more and more products. Ultimately, that is where we can make a difference, linking in with the bigger players and those trading internationally.

One seizure by Border Force can result in months and months of investigation for us, and we can compile hundreds of intelligence logs from that one investigation. At the moment, we struggle to disseminate all that intelligence back out to Border Force, to close that loop, because we just do not have the resource to develop that. We have to be selective in what we deal with, but we certainly support Border Force in the work we all do on a day-to-day basis, and we welcome the introduction of the Bill.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

Q There are other jurisdictions around the world where there have been ivory bans. What sort of best practice do you feel can be gleaned from those other places—the United States perhaps most notably? What lessons do you think we can learn and apply when this legislation is passed for the UK?

Grant Miller: Chief Inspector Hubble and I were fortunate last year to do a training mission in South Africa for seven sub-Saharan Africans, in conjunction with the Chinese CITES management authority. During that workshop, the Chinese presented their comparative interpretation of the US ban and the Chinese ban and of the impact of these. It became evident that their view was that the Chinese ban was far more robust and had delivered closure of the trade. They felt that the US ban had left so many exemptions that the trade was allowed to continue despite there being a ban. If you accept their argument, we would like to see enforcement having to allow as few exemptions as possible so that the ban is, in reality, a ban on the ivory.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Pollard]

Q On that point, one of the areas the Bill Committee is looking at is whether the scope should include elephant ivory or just ivory. When it comes to your enforcement activities, if the scope were to include other forms of ivory—walrus, narwhal, sperm whale, and such types—does that fundamentally change the quantum of the task that you and the new regulator have to carry out? Is it a huge amount of work? How would you categorise the additional activities that extending the scope would mean for your work?

Grant Miller: I do not think there would be a great expansion for us. Many of the species that you could be looking at, for example, hippopotamus, etc., are already listed on CITES. If we were to see them on import or export and there were no permits, our action would still be the same to seize and refer.

If mammoth ivory or warthog, that have been mentioned, are brought in, we have the ability to detect them, but we are not taking any seizure action. We are almost doing half of it. We are detecting it, but we are not then building the case and making the referral. I think the increase in work would be marginal for us at the border.

Chief Inspector Hubble: The role of policing throughout the UK is to uphold and enforce the law and deal with those who break it and we will continue to do that. From an intelligence perspective, we currently do not have any evidence to suggest that the trade around those other species is of significant number to warrant anything. We have to look at priority species that we deal with. In CITES, we have a number of priority species that we look at that have been raised there either from a conservation perspective or from a volume crime perspective. We would have to be intelligence-led and guided by scientific authorities before we would be able to put them on the Bill, because we have to be intelligence-led as a police unit.

[Sue Hayman]

Q I want to come back to the internet because it is a big challenge. Assuming the Bill goes through, and I see no reason why it should not, the situation will only get worse with illegal trade on the internet. We had a quick look on eBay and the number of items that just pop up is staggering. As you said, the descriptions were “bovine bone”, “ivory coloured”, “resin” and all sorts of things. When you look at them, I would worry that they were really ivory.

I do not know how we tackle this. This may sound naïve, but I do not know the answers. Do you have the ability to do “stop and search” random checks on items being sold from eBay, for example? Is that something that the police can do? If you looked at something and thought it was ivory, would you have the power to go in and check it?

Chief Inspector Hubble: If the information is in the public domain and the item is being openly sold on eBay, we can take screenshots, get details of the seller of these items and our intelligence function would do some research with eBay to look at other items that they have bought and sold. We would start to build that intelligence package with a view to going out to police forces to get some enforcement action taken.

[Sue Hayman]

Q With that in mind, would it be useful to have some sort of legal responsibility on website owners to ensure to the best of their ability that they were not selling illegal products? Is that a possibility? I am trying to think about ways in which we could potentially tackle this.

Chief Inspector Hubble: The Bill provides for an offence of facilitating.

[Sue Hayman]

Q Could that be made stronger to enable you to do your job better?

Chief Inspector Hubble: The approach to eBay initially got ivory removed as a category. People are now selling it as all the things that you have just looked at, and eBay will argue that it has too many items to police each one of them. It has a legal framework in place and anybody who tries to take eBay to court for facilitating an offence under the Bill is a braver person than I am.

[Sue Hayman]

Q Does eBay have some sort of contract with its sellers to say that sellers should confirm that what they are selling is not illegal? I do not know. I am just chucking out questions.

Chief Inspector Hubble: I do not know.

[Sue Hayman]

Q I wonder if that is something you could look into. Where do you put the burden of proof? Is it possible to get internet sellers to sign up to a contract?

Chief Inspector Hubble: We would certainly welcome better self-policing and self-regulating by online auction houses with some responsibility on them for the items that they are making money from the sale of. I do not know how we do that.

[Sue Hayman]

Thank you, I am just chucking out thoughts.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)]

Q I join members of the Committee in thanking you and your teams for the work you are doing and also for the way in which you are leveraging the rest of the Border Force or the wider police force available to tackle this crime—we are very grateful.

To go back to the regulator for a minute though, do you both agree that having the regulator in place will help you with your work, because it will help to raise awareness of the new regime that will come into place, and because it will work with the antiques sector and musicians to help to improve compliance and assess compliance in future? Would that help you with your work?

Grant Miller: It would certainly help us. We have found the antiques trade to be very receptive. We have delivered training sessions to it on the rules and regulations, and generally, the larger auction houses have been keen to work with us and to drive the illegal trade out of their supply chain. An increased resource—another body—actually going round and delivering a prevention message, and helping and enabling an understanding of the controls, will assist us, but an awful lot of the illegal trade at the moment sits outwith the regular auction houses. It is private individuals who are sourcing ivory from car boots, house clearances and so on, and that illegal trade will continue. They have no intention of complying with any rules or regulations, so that market will continue for us to police.

Chief Inspector Hubble: From an enforcement perspective, we echo those thoughts about working with auction houses. We are regularly contacted by people within the industry for advice—for them to satisfy themselves that they are complying. Although it is good to raise awareness of an issue, ultimately that may result in increased reporting of it. Once the Bill comes into force, if a member of the public sees something on sale that they think is ivory, inevitably they will report it, which comes back to the issue of resourcing and how we deal with the potential increase in the volume of crimes that we will have coming in to us.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Cameron]

Q I understand that, but if you can get an extra one for losing one, is there potential for extra ones to arrive in the system somewhere?

Anthony Browne: One would have to ask the people who administered that, but I do not think the provisions in the Bill are weak. They should be workable, just like issuing any paperwork.

Mark Dodgson: The certificates are in respect of the most distinguished objects. They are all unique, and they are not likely to be easily muddled up with something else. If the concern is that they could be mixed up with other objects and used for other objects, I think that is unlikely.

Anthony Browne: If I may, I will add something to this. Certification is straightforward, because you are dealing with objects that are unique, rare and important, so there are not likely to be lots of them. I do have some concerns with the registration requirement for the de minimis objects. There is a sort of Catch-22 built into the de minimis. The Government have opted for 10% by volume. We argued for a higher percentage, in common with other countries, but the Government took that decision—so be it.

What the registration of objects will mean is this. There are quite a number of common or garden, utilitarian objects—many of your constituents probably own them if there has been a death and the house has been cleared—with minute amounts of ivory in them. They are by no means unique objects: they are Victorian or Georgian chests of drawers with tiny ivory lock holes and that sort of thing. There is no indication as yet what the cost of registration will be—one of you asked about that—but it could make selling such things completely uneconomical. The managing director of Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh sent me an email making that point. They are frequently asked to clear out estates when people are downsizing or moving house.

In the future, families who want to sell such things will be faced with two options. If there is something that looks like a small bit of ivory, it falls within this Bill, although it is well under the de minimis. If the cost of registration is more than negligible, the family is very unlikely to want to do that as it will simply not be economical, particularly as they do not know whether the object will sell. It could lead to an awful lot of objects with small amounts of ivory, which are reusable and recyclable and can be used again instead of buying new furniture, ending up in landfill because people cannot register them because the cost is too great. Even if they do register them, they are by no means unique, so what will the register do to help? I do not see how the register helps with a chest of drawers that looks identical to thousands of its cousins. Our concept was always that if an object is below the de minimis, it should be saleable—straightforward. If you sell something above the de minimis because you get it wrong, you are liable to criminal or civil prosecution, which is as it should be.

The registration of de minimis will do two things. You will simply deter people from registering, and then these objects will be destroyed or mutilated, as people try to hack the bits of ivory off—what is the point of that?—or they will just end up in landfill. I do not think this is a sensible aim. I wonder whether the Committee could look at this again. I do not think it would weaken the Bill in any shape or form. It would still be very easy to police, as it is a very low de minimis, and it will be completely apparent whether an object contains more or less than 10%. The penalties exist, and so on and so forth. It will prevent a lot of things that can usefully be used again or bought by the next generation from being used in that way. I do not think doing this will undermine the objective of the Bill at all. I just suggest that as a point that has been made to me.

[Sue Hayman]

Q I was going to ask whether any of you have concerns about the de minimis requirement—whether we need further clarification of that, whether you had looked at how the volume of ivory is measured, and whether the Secretary of State should set the measurement. Do you measure it now, and is there is a best practice way of doing it? We do not want items to be calculated slightly wrongly and to fall into the criminal section just because there are different ways of measuring volume. I just want to hear your thoughts about that.

Anthony Browne: Yes, I quite agree. I think the 10% means that it is pretty straightforward, but because of the penalties people will always err on the side of caution. We were very pleased that the Government chose volume, rather than weight, which is notoriously impossible to judge—volume is a sensible way of approaching it. As I said at the beginning, we think 10% is rather low, but we live in the real world. I do not think 10% by volume will be impossible, but people will err on the side of caution, so I would have thought that you will probably not get people rubbing up against the maximum and risking criminal penalties.

Mark Dodgson: Members of the British Antique Dealers’ Association were quite surprised at the 10% and the way it was set. We could not quite see from the documentation in the consultation why 10% had been chosen, versus perhaps 30% or 40%. Just so that you are aware, because the 10% is proposed to be set in that way, items such as a silver teapot—this is a Georgian silver teapot with an original ivory handle—

[The Chair]

Order. Although this sitting is being televised, it is not particularly regular for Hansard to have to describe artefacts. Given that this is perhaps a unique circumstance, could you briefly describe it for the record?

Mark Dodgson: Yes, I am showing an image of a silver teapot with an ivory handle. Sorry, Chairman. The point is to make it clear that this is the type of object that, set at 10%, would fall above the de minimis. It would be fairly straightforward to identify that as being more than 10%. My members are very concerned that the only other exemption that the teapot could attempt to meet would be the clause 2 exemption. The query among our membership is whether objects of that nature would actually meet the clause 2 requirements.

On the point about estimating the proportion of ivory, 10% for some items is all right. For inlaid objects it falls right in the middle of a series of smaller objects with ivory inlay, such as Indian Vizagapatam boxes and so on. It would be quite difficult for dealers to work out which side of the 10% they are on.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kerry McCarthy]

That is interesting. Thank you.

[Sue Hayman]

Q There is obviously talk about prescribed institutions and qualifying museums and there has also been talk of a register of exempted items. The Secretary of State will keep a list of those registered or qualifying museums and prescribed institutions. If an institution is found to have been breaking the law, how do you see that being managed within your industry? Should the Secretary of State be able to take them off the register? Should further criminal action be taken? How would the industry look at policing itself within that category?

Hartwig Fischer: I would be very surprised if any of those institutions breached the law. We have extremely strict procedures in place for due diligence on provenance. Before any object enters our collection, it goes through many filters and is closely monitored. My understanding is that it would be exceedingly difficult for any of these institutions to do this. It is unlikely that something like this would happen inadvertently. It would be most exceptional for something like this to happen. I am very confident that these institutions are extremely conscientious when it comes to acquiring objects.

Anthony Misquitta: There is a very strict accreditation regime for museums in this country. Accreditation is by Arts Council England. Where a museum falls foul of those very strict rules, it loses its accreditation and that is catastrophic. It loses its Government indemnity scheme, it is unable to loan to or receive loans from other museums, and its charitable status is thrown into jeopardy. There are a number of checks and balances in the accreditation regime.

I will not say that museums never break the rules, because it is a very tough climate for museums—not the likes of the museums before you, but it is a difficult period for regional museums. Sometimes they are faced with the stark option of selling an item or closing, for example. They might sell an item and run the risk of losing their accreditation, but it is not something that they would do lightly and it is devastating if they do.

It may be necessary for the Arts Council to think about adding reference to this legislation to its accreditation tests.

[Sue Hayman]

Q So would that be the most sensible way to go forward be to bring the legislation into the Arts Council accreditation system?

Anthony Misquitta: I think so. I am talking off the top of my head, but that is a possible answer.

[Sue Hayman]

Q Would that cover galleries as well? Does the Arts Council accredit galleries? Yes, they are nodding at the back. Thank you very much.

[Trudy Harrison]

Q Do you have any concerns about differences of opinion between the expert assessors in assessing whether something would be exempt or not?

Dr Boström: According to the criteria that are set out here?

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

Q You have done a lot of work to explain that museums do not get involved in a huge number of sales, and perhaps get involved in a very small number of purchases. What I was talking about—I should have been clearer—was the rare and most important items that you and institutions like you help to certify. Do you anticipate large volumes or small volumes? What volumes do you think will qualify under the definition of rare and most important?

Hartwig Fischer: I am personally not in a position to answer that question, I am afraid, because I do not have a sufficiently deep and detailed overview of what is happening in the trade. We see from the museum side that a very small quantity of objects qualify to enter the museum. When it comes to museums and what we see generally, even following what is happening in auctions, we are talking about small quantities. We are not talking about thousands of objects. The material that is historically relevant and significant is very limited.

Dr Boström: If one were to talk about taste in ivory carving and collecting, we always associate the working of it more with the 17th and 18th centuries, and the collectors with the end of the 19th century. It is not foremost in collecting practices or trends.

Hartwig Fischer: It remains to be seen what will actually come up for certification. One will have to react to the volume to see how best to deal and cope with it efficiently.

[Sue Hayman]

Q Earlier, you were talking about resources—there is obviously a certain amount of work that comes with this. You are clearly very large institutions, and you have a broad range of specialists and experts within your museums. What might the impact be on smaller museums that do not have such access to specialists? Will there be a cost implication for them?

Dr Boström: I imagine that, in parallel with the export licensing, even if objects were to come to a small museum or be associated with it, it will be devolved back to the major national museums—where many of the experts reside, because of a reduction of curatorial staff in our regional museums—to help them, in the way we do in other cases.

Hartwig Fischer: We have wide-ranging national partnership programmes in place. We work with 150 small and bigger institutions across the country. There is a well-established network of exchange, skill sharing and trust. We are confident that we will find a solution. We are engaged in helping museums that do not have the expertise to cope with these questions.

[Sue Hayman]

Thank you. That is very helpful.

[The Chair]

If there are no further questions from Members, I thank the witnesses for their evidence today.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned.—(Mims Davies.)