Hunting Trophies (Import Prohibition) Bill

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Report stage
Friday 17th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sir Bill Wiggin]

It is good to see you in the Chair, Mr Speaker.

New clause 1 concerns duration and would cause the Bill’s provisions to cease to have effect five years after it is passed. In 2019, we stood on a manifesto commitment to ban imports from the trophy hunting of endangered animals. I therefore propose that the sunset clause be added for the simple purpose of ensuring that the Act, should it prove unsuccessful in protecting endangered species, can be withdrawn. If, on the other hand, after five years, the Act does in fact prove successful in achieving the stated aims of our manifesto commitment, the Secretary of State would have the power to extend the expiration date by up to five years.

I have been concerned throughout the progress of the Bill that it is not motivated by a desire to see African wildlife flourish and prosper. If it were, it would have paid heed to the scientific evidence provided by experts in conservation. British conservationists Professor Amy Dickman and Adam Hart have argued that 90% of protected areas with lions are severely underfunded. Removing trophy hunting without providing suitable alternative revenue will expose those underfunded protected areas to further risks, such as poaching. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature red list, trophy hunting is not considered to be a threat driving any species to extinction. Instead, trophy hunting generates revenue for anti-poaching and habitat conservation. It has been recognised as a positive tool for conservation in multiple species—including black rhino, white rhino, argali, macaw, some populations of lion, and white-tailed deer—and maintains extensive areas of wildlife habitat.

High commissioners from Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania and Zimbabwe argued in a letter to the Minister of State in the Foreign Office:

“Well-managed trophy hunting—the prevailing model in all our countries—contributes to reductions in habitat loss and poaching. It has proved a demonstrable conservation tool for multiple species, including endangered ones such as black rhinos.”

Maxi Louis, the director of NASCO, the Namibian Association of Community Based Natural Resource Management Support Organisations, wrote in a letter to my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Henry Smith):

“Take away those employed to protect wildlife in the reserves and poachers move into the vacuum. This quickly leads to huge losses of endangered animals. Yet what really angers us is how these animals die. Snaring leads to appalling injuries and pitifully slow deaths. Poisoning is traumatic, lions vomiting for hours, as they pass away.”

She wrote that

“when Botswana had a temporary ban on paid hunting there was a 593% increase in fresh elephant carcasses being found.”

Professor Amy Dickman, a conservation biologist and director of the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit at the University of Oxford, has also argued that the Bill will facilitate an increase in poaching. She has described her distress while carrying out fieldwork in Africa, where she witnessed the horrendous aftermath of a lioness trapped in a poacher’s snare, a decapitated hyena and a leopard with its paw mangled in a trap, all of which had suffered more painful and prolonged deaths from poachers than from a hunter’s bullet.

The concern held by both conservationists and African community leaders is that, by enforcing the removal of the vital source of revenue supplied by trophy hunters to these communities, we open the floodgates to poachers, who will cause far more cruelty and pain to the animals and pose a far greater threat to endangered species. The opinions and evidence from these experts do not fill me with a lot of confidence that the Bill will achieve its stated aim, nor does the misinformation that is being touted by the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting.

I have tabled new clause 1 to ensure that the Bill is not a classic case of virtue signalling at the expense of African wildlife and the conservation efforts of African people. If, five years down the line, the Act proves to be ineffective, as I suspect it will, at conserving endangered species and has led to an increase in poaching, it seems right that provision should be made for the Act to be withdrawn. If the supporters of the Bill are so confident that it will achieve the desired result of protecting endangered species and not encouraging poachers, who I believe are a greater threat to these endangered species than well-regulated hunting, why not include this sunset clause in it?

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

How much, in percentage terms, of the budget to protect wildlife comes from trophy hunting?

[Sir Bill Wiggin]

All of it. One of the problems I will come to in a moment is that, where we are asking people to stop trophy hunting, we are not necessarily replacing that with funding. In one area, which I look looking forward to telling the House about in a moment, we do provide funding, and we are encouraging local people to protect their wildlife and build businesses, particularly for the women, but they are arguing that, by withdrawing trophy hunting, we are cutting the legs off that effort. There are real contradictions here, which is why it is such a difficult subject.

--- Later in debate ---

[Henry Smith]

I am grateful for that message of congratulations and for highlighting Eduardo and the campaign efforts he has led for so many years to achieve this conservation effort.

[Bob Stewart]

I have a quick point to make. I find it distasteful to have heads on walls, but I believe those heads that are already on walls and rugs that are already down are not affected by this Bill at all.

[Henry Smith]

This legislation takes effect from when it is passed and receives Royal Assent; it is not retrospective in that sense. With that, I ask Members to support the Bill on Third Reading.