Plans to Improve the Natural Environment and Animal Welfare

Lord Lexden Excerpts

Thursday 7th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lexden (Con)]

My Lords, I hope that my noble friend Lord Caithness will not be displeased if I add a little on the issues of animal welfare that have featured so far in his debate, which he introduced so effectively.

There are so many types and breeds of animals for whose improved welfare we should strive as we prepare for Brexit and the prospect of stronger powers here at Westminster to use on their behalf, for they are vital to our welfare. Our domestic pets deserve the highest place on the agenda for improvement and change. They give love and friendship to so many. They serve disabled people with unstinting loyalty, giving them freedom to work and enjoy recreations that would otherwise be denied to them. As people live longer and need close companionship, our pets will become ever more important.

Many great men have recognised the significance of the bond between humankind and the animals we take into our homes. Dogs, cats and budgerigars vied for Winston Churchill’s considerable affections. Indeed, if he had had his way, pigs—whom he greatly admired—would also have been invited to join the Chartwell menagerie, within careful limits.

I personally know of no one to whom our domestic pets in general and cats in particular matter more than my noble friend Lord Black of Brentwood. Unfortunately, he is precluded from speaking in this debate by engagement elsewhere. I speak for him as well as myself. Years ago, during a general election campaign in the Thatcher era, my noble friend and I amused ourselves by drawing up a manifesto setting out the measures that would be needed to attract the support of animals if these dear creatures had the vote. What would have to be in such a manifesto today to get cats to put their cross against a Tory candidate? They would rightly look for stringent measures to keep dread diseases away from our shores. Enhanced border checks of cats and kittens are required, along with a central register of feline immigrants and tick and tapeworm treatment to prevent the import of foreign infections.

No less important to fluffy voters would be a crackdown on appalling breeding practices that bring to birth cats sentenced to a lifetime of pain by disfiguring features such as a flat face. It is time to stop the unregulated breeding of cats, which our country has hitherto permitted. The Government should back a public education campaign to highlight the sheer wickedness of insupportable breeding practices. Next, cats parted by misfortune from their owners would want to be reunited as quickly as possible with them. In microchipping, we have the answer to that devastating separation. It should be made compulsory. As for other menaces that cats want curbed, they would welcome the forthcoming consultation on air weapon licences and the prospect that fewer of their number will be peppered cruelly by shots fired by guns for which, at the moment, no licences are required in England.

The wise election candidate in search of votes from domestic animals would give strong backing to a revision of the pet travel scheme, known generally as the pet passport. It has many benefits, but dogs as well as cats need action to deal with the sharp rise in the number of very young, badly abused immigrants. Many puppies arrive in Britain unvaccinated, having travelled in appalling conditions, to be sold online. Investigations over the years by the Dogs Trust have shown how puppies, sometimes under the age of 15 weeks, are often sedated to smuggle them across borders and how data on passports is falsified. The abuse of the pet passport must be tackled urgently, with tough new penalties on illegal trading. Too many of these poor creatures are sold from puppy farms here in the UK via normal-looking homes which are, in fact, just a shopfront for unscrupulous puppy-dealing rings. Young canine voters would welcome what has already been done to crack down on irresponsible advertising in this area but would want more to be done to educate their potential owners, especially at this time of year, about the dangers—and to get potential owners to ensure that they are buying a healthy, happy and vaccinated puppy from a responsible breeder.

Some 17 million cats and dogs in every part of our country bring joy to nearly half of all households. The vast majority of them are loved and cared for by responsible owners, but there are some whose start in life is cruel, who become stray or abandoned, and who are mistreated or injured. I look forward to hearing from my noble friend, who I know is a champion of their interests, what the Government are doing to improve their welfare. I hope that I have almost persuaded noble Lords that our much-loved, sentient pets should be given the vote.