Ivory Bill

Debate between Baroness Vere of Norbiton and Baroness Quin

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

My Lords, the Government fully appreciate the sentiment behind the amendments in this group. Monitoring the implementation and impacts of the ban on the ivory market and other affected sectors is very important.

I turn first to Amendment 41, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, on the publication of a report on matters relating to the exemptions to the ban. In Committee, there was widespread agreement in your Lordships’ House about the importance of transparency and providing information to the public. I believe that the Government’s commitment to share publicly information on exemptions, in line with the Data Protection Act, was welcomed. We are committed to publish data on appeals, the number of items registered and the number of exemption certificates issued and revoked each year and to include a breakdown of these numbers into categories such as statues, reliefs, furniture and musical instruments. The noble Baroness’s amendment reflects these commitments, for which I am grateful, and I am happy to repeat them today. I cannot, however, agree that an amendment is needed and hope that the commitments that the Government have made will suffice.

I turn to Amendment 78, again in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, regarding a report on the impact and implementation of the Bill. I appreciate that the noble Baroness has reflected points raised in Committee in this amendment. I reassure your Lordships’ House that, as a matter of course, the Government will assess the impact and implementation of the ban over time, in particular its enforcement. Much of this information will be available in the public domain and subject to public scrutiny.

It might assist noble Lords if I give a number of related examples of where this kind of information is already provided publicly. Perhaps this will assist the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, in understanding the types of information that we will be publishing. The regulatory body that we have chosen to help enforce the ivory ban, the Office for Product Safety and Standards, already publishes an annual report which includes its activity over the year for each of the different regulatory areas the body covers. The Animal and Plant Health Authority, which will administer the registration system among other things, submits annual trade data on used permits to the secretariat of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species—CITES. This data is available publicly on the CITES database. The National Wildlife Crime Unit, where appropriate, issues press releases on closed cases it has been involved in, often including the penalties issued. These publications will continue, and we will consider how we can provide further information that will complement but not duplicate them. An obligation in the Bill to produce reports would risk duplication and be a considerable and unnecessarily expensive undertaking.

With regard to the Department for International Development, a number of announcements were made at the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference earlier this month about additional funds being made available from DfID and Defra, including £46.6 million to protect endangered species and a £20 million round of UK Aid Match for wildlife and conservation issues. Any programme that is run by DfID must publish an annual review online demonstrating its results.

With regard to nations generating income from ivory, as referred to in Amendment 78, we believe that the decline in elephant populations deprives some of the poorest countries in the world of their natural resources, which impacts economic growth and sustainable development. The illegal ivory trade is conducted almost uniquely by organised criminal groups and the money from this despicable trade rarely reaches local communities and the people who need it.

At the request of the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, I will not respond directly to her amendment, but I hope that she takes comfort from my words about the types of data that we will be drawing out and the categories of items that we will be able to summarise.

I hope that I have been able to reassure the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and that the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, feels able to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Quin]

My Lords, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.