Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Hodgson of Abinger and Baroness Fookes

Report stage & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 17th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)]

My Lords, I shall speak also in support of Amendments 72 and 73 in this group, which were tabled by my noble friend Lady Fookes. I remind noble Lords of my registered interests, which I highlighted in Committee.

All three amendments would enable us to put an end to much suffering incurred by thousands of animals when they are exported for slaughter or fattening. In their manifesto, the Government committed to end excessively long journeys for slaughter or fattening, so let us take this opportunity to deliver on that promise and put it in the Bill. Why wait? As I said in Committee, exporting animals for slaughter is simply a welfare insult. In this day and age there is no reason why they cannot travel on the hook rather than on the hoof.

I do not want to reiterate all the examples we discussed in Committee, but I remind your Lordships to look at the figures. The Animal and Plant Health Agency reported that around 40,000 animals were exported last year. Of those, around 30,000 were sheep, with only around half going to the continent. Some were transported all the way across Europe to countries that have a large onward trade to the Middle East. The long journeys are stressful for the animals and in some cases result in enormous suffering due to, for example, overcrowding, high summer temperatures and injuries received en route. On top of that, they can end up in fattening or slaughter systems that would be illegal in this country.

I believe that even in this country animals should be slaughtered at the closest point to production as a default option, and Amendment 73 addresses this. I understand that it is supported by the BVA. While I understand that various options in this area are being looked at, I point out that Amendment 73 would not come into effect until the end of January 2023, which gives us time to achieve that. As this was in our manifesto, surely the Bill is the right place to move this agenda forward and ensure that it happens.

Amendment 71 builds on the debate we had in Committee. In addition to Amendments 72 and 73, which focus on slaughter and fattening, and restricting journey times, it would specifically prohibit the export from Great Britain of farmed animals for slaughter without stunning. It provides that farmed animals transported from Great Britain to Northern Ireland for slaughter must be slaughtered in Northern Ireland and cannot be taken further afield before being killed.

In Committee the Minister stated:

“The Government encourage the highest standards of animal welfare. Although our policy is to prefer that animals are stunned prior to slaughter, we accept the rights of Jewish and Muslim communities to eat meat killed in accordance with their religious beliefs”.—[Official Report, 16/7/20; col. 1801.]


I emphasise that I too respect the needs of our multicultural society in the UK. If, as the Minister stated, it is our policy to prefer that animals are stunned prior to slaughter, as long as enough animals are killed in accordance for UK halal and kosher consumption, I see no reason for the Government not to accept this amendment regarding export.

Indeed, the RSPCA and Compassion in World Farming have highlighted that more animals than are needed are already killed without stunning for UK halal and kosher consumption so that they are more flexible for sale. Figures from the Food Standards Agency indicate that in 2018 more than 94 million cattle, sheep and poultry were slaughtered without stunning. In addition, a Food Standards Agency report last year highlighted that 90,000 of the 2.9 million non-stunned animals slaughtered for kosher-certified meat were rejected as unfit for religious consumption and went into the general market unlabelled. This needs to be addressed so that there is equality of choice and those who would choose not to eat meat from an animal killed without stunning can identify that meat.

The BVA states that there is evidence that non-stun slaughter is highly likely to cause pain, suffering and distress. More animals than are needed are currently killed without stunning for the UK market. I personally find the figures I stated shocking and believe that we should kill only as locally as possible and only what is needed in this way.

The amendment would not prevent UK communities eating meat killed in accordance with their religious beliefs. What it would do is prevent British animals having to undergo long, stressful journeys to be killed in a way highly likely to cause pain and distress. Surely one of the main reasons for leaving the EU was so that we could put in place laws that we feel are right. The litmus test of humanity in a country is how we treat the vulnerable, and animals are surely among the most vulnerable. This trade is just utterly cruel, and if the UK wishes to consider itself a country leading in animal welfare, it needs to stop such practices around the export of animals now. I beg to move.

[Baroness Fookes (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lady Hodgson of Abinger most warmly. She has put the case on the various amendments powerfully, with great conviction and great compassion. I share her feelings and I hope this will not be lost on my noble friends on the Front Bench.

I do not want to add any more to what my noble friend said on her Amendment 71, except to point out that when the original exemption was made to allow religious communities with real scruples to have animals that have not been pre-stunned, it was never intended that they should be the subject of exports. I see no reason why unscrupulous traders should benefit from this so that they can send animals away to where pre-stunning is not so common. This ought to be dealt with very quickly indeed.

The amendment standing in my name and supported by my noble friend is a reintroduction of an amendment I brought forward in Committee to ban the export of live animals for slaughter or for fattening. This has been a gripe and a passion of mine for many years—in fact, since I was a young MP in the House of Commons. That shows you how long ago it was, because I am no longer the spring chicken—probably some people would regard me as an old boiler.

I feel very strongly on this issue, but I have concerns even about my own amendment, because we have had to include a provision permitting animals going to Northern Ireland freely to go into the Republic because of the withdrawal arrangement. This worries me enormously, because, once they are there, they can then be moved freely around all countries belonging to the European Union. Although there are supposedly welfare regulations which prevent them travelling for too long, they are weak and not enforced, so you might as well say they do not exist at all, because that is the plain fact of the matter. I worry that those who still want to send animals abroad will use this provision as a loophole.

I became more concerned about this only very recently. I did not know that the Port of Ramsgate, through which most animals currently exported go, tried to ban animals passing through it. The exporters took the port to court and unfortunately the court found for them and not for the port. That indicates the lengths to which they will go. Therefore, I am concerned about the possibility of animals being sent to Northern Ireland and the situation being almost worse than that which we have now. That is something on which I hope the Government will reflect carefully. I hope that they will be able to tell us that they will come forward with some arrangement, beyond my ken, which deals with this situation.

The other amendment standing in my name, again supported by my noble friend, would ration the hours which animals can spend in transport. I accept that this is a probing amendment. I am concerned about the hours for which animals travel, which came home to me in Committee, when I was horrified to learn of the extent to which animals travel within the United Kingdom. I had not quite appreciated that, so concerned had I been about animals going abroad. I saw this as an opportunity again to take up one of the manifesto commitments on ending excessively long hours for animals in transport. I remind my noble friends of that commitment.

I accept that this is a slightly strange way round of doing things. Normally, if a Government were going to introduce a measure such as this, they would get hold of the “stakeholders” beforehand—I think that is still the fashionable expression; that is, those whose livelihood depends on farming and transporting and who might be affected by any changes in the rules and regulations—and experts, such as vets and key farmers, who understand all the details of what it means to transport animals and can bring their expertise to bear. It is quite likely that one would want different hours for different types of animal. We know that calves are extremely sensitive to travel and feel it much more—they are also much more closely affected by temperature fluctuations. It also depends on the vehicles carrying them: whether they are good, bad or indifferent. My proposed new clause would permit distinctions to be made, and there is also a time lag. None the less, I recognise that this is the wrong way around, and I am sure that people can pick every manner of hole in the suggestions that I have made. However, my main concern is to ensure that the Government get on with this and bring forward really good arrangements.

I understand that the Farm Animal Welfare Committee has done a lot of detailed work on this issue, so I hope that we can pick up on that, in addition to the point already made by my noble friend, that the British Veterinary Association has it laid down as a cardinal principle that animals should be slaughtered or fattened as near as possible to where they were born or raised. I look to the Government this evening to bring forward some real progress.