Control of Horses Bill

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Friday 24th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy) on having had the determination to present the Bill.

I am not sure whether I need to declare an interest. I have kept horses and ponies for a long time, but I can assure the House that I have never fly-grazed one of mine. Like many other horse owners, I am acutely aware of the cost of responsible horse ownership. I seem to spend an inordinate amount of my time focusing on a reduction in numbers—not altogether successfully, because the direction of travel always seems to be up.

My hon. Friend rightly identified the issue of irresponsible ownership, but let me emphasise that the vast majority of Britain’s horse owners are entirely responsible. Their animals are, in many ways, treated like their children. Just like other pet animals, they are part of the family—loved, cherished and looked after. There are many of them: although no accurate figures exist, which is a problem in itself, it is thought that there are between 600,000 and 1.2 million horses in the United Kingdom. They are also big business. In 2011, the British Equestrian Trade Association estimated that the horse industry contributed £2.8 billion to the British economy every year.

According to some terrifying statistics produced by Equine World UK, the cost of keeping a single horse can range between just over £3,000 and £10,000 a year, depending on how the horse is kept. The British Horse Society has produced a detailed breakdown of the costs of responsible horse ownership. Interestingly, there is no total at the end, and I did not dare tot up the sums; suffice it to say that they are the sort of eye-watering numbers that I have spent all my life trying to keep from my father.

Those figures, of course, relate to responsible ownership. They include farriery costs and the costs of vaccinations, worming, equine dentists and vets. Those are costs that all who cherish their animals willingly pay, but the owners described by my hon. Friend simply do not bother with them. That is the reason for the horrific welfare cases with which so many equine charities are struggling to cope. When they are called to places such as Alton in Hampshire, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), the rescue charities are not contending with fit and healthy animals; they are dealing with starving, sick animals, riddled with parasites, and with hooves that have grown to such an extent that they bring to mind pictures that used to be seen only in advertisements for foreign welfare charities.

I picked Alton—perhaps unfairly, as my hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire cannot be here today—largely because when I was chief executive of the National Pony Society, it was based in that town. The NPS is Britain’s oldest pony charity, and is dedicated to the welfare of British native breeds and the British riding pony. It does not have a rescue facility of its own, but it is a member of the National Equine Welfare Council.

I remember from meetings that I attended back in 2008-09 that the welfare crisis was well known then, and the rescue centres were already struggling to cope. Wind the clock forward five-plus years, and the situation is much worse. The numbers are much higher, the cost of feed has gone up, and charities that were previously struggling to cope have now gone beyond breaking point. That does not mean that they are not doing their absolute best in extremely difficult circumstances. When, as happened in Alton, they are called to a field of 45 horses that have been dumped by their owners—and, in that instance, multiple owners were thought to have been involved—for whatever reason, and have been left to fend for themselves as a herd, the charities are already at capacity, and in many cases, sadly, there is only one viable option. No one likes to talk about euthanasia, but for sick, old, lame and starving horses it can be the kindest option. However, there are then the costs of destruction. The British Horse Society estimates that it can easily run to £500 per animal, and who is to pick up the bill when animals are not necessarily microchipped or freeze-branded and no one can trace the legal owner?

The case that I have just described occurred on what was definitely private land. Let me now say something about what happens on local authority-owned land. I have never forgotten the sight of two small ponies trotting down Coxford road in Southampton right past the general hospital. Few Members in the Chamber today will recognise the geography of Southampton, so let me assure them that that is right in the urban core of the city. I have no idea where those two ponies had come from, but the only pieces of open land anywhere near there are the cemetery, the municipal golf course, Southampton common and the sports centre, all of which are owned by the city council.

I do not know if those ponies had come from any of those areas, but I do know that fly-grazing has been a problem in the city for many years. It has happened on both private and public land, but areas such as Peartree green have frequently been abused in this way, and it causes distress and concern for local residents. Many of them are simply not used to seeing relatively large animals with potentially dangerous traits—I learned from a very early age that they kick at one end and bite at the other—and it can be extremely scary, especially for the parents of young children who wish to use the play areas and the sports pitches, and also for the horses themselves, which are not usually used to being in an urban environment and can sometimes be found tethered with inadequate access to food and water and without the sort of shelter responsible owners lavish upon them.

Of course in the Romsey and Southampton North constituency we might reasonably expect horses to be commonplace. There is a small corner of the New Forest in my constituency and at Canada and Wellow commons we can find the indigenous New Forest ponies in abundance. I am the first to celebrate feral ponies running wild—our traditional mountain and moorland breeds, which can be found in their natural state all over the British isles. It entertained me earlier to hear the Minister speaking of the national parks of Exmoor and Dartmoor, but in many cases it is our national parks where we find our native species running free, from the Exmoor and Dartmoor ponies in the south-west to the original Thelwell ponies on the Shetland islands—as an aside, Norman Thelwell was one of Romsey’s most famous former residents, who lived on the banks of the river Test. However, these are distinct cases and very different from the situations my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer has identified in his Bill, but I am sure he has considered them, and fully considered how the national park authorities might address this sort of issue, should they encounter it.

In other parts of my constituency there have been real problems with semi-feral herds of ponies, including an unfortunate incident earlier this year at Braishfield, where a large number of ponies escaped and ran loose through the famous Harold Hillier gardens and arboretum, causing much damage. While there can be an almost comical aspect to the prospect of police community support officers, police officers and local residents running through the gardens chasing after roughly 80 ponies, it is not funny for a motorist who encounters a dark-coloured pony in the dead of night standing in the middle of the road.

If we find a horse or pony loose, they are very tricky to identify. Yes, since 2009 all foals have had to be microchipped, but when there are large fields of horses with no discernible owner indiscriminately breeding among themselves, who exactly is checking whether they all have passports or microchips? Local authorities simply do not have the resources or the expertise to be matching fields of feral horses to what in many cases is non-existent documentation.

My hon. Friend the Member for York Outer rightly referred to the problem of over-breeding and identified that in many instances owners might decide simply to continue breeding when there is no viable market for the stock they produce. I would highlight that those who breed responsibly do so very scientifically and with much thought, in many cases with generations of knowledge and expertise, but even they, producing very high quality animals with commitment, love and dedication, cannot find homes for all the ponies they produce—or certainly are finding it very difficult to do so with an economic return on them. Why then are irresponsible owners simply getting away with indiscriminate breeding? In many cases, close relatives will be breeding among themselves, producing many conformational defects and horses that are never going to be any use on the open market because they are not sound and never will be.

Earlier this year a loose pony was found on the A36 trunk road running through my constituency. I met one of my constituents clinging desperately on to it with a length of washing line in the car park of the local convenience store, and I did the decent thing and took it home. As I did so, I spoke to a police officer who had been forced to stop all the traffic on the trunk road, and a jam was building up. I said, “What do I do with it now? How are we going to find the owner?” I was met with the response, “We’ll just wait until somebody notices it is missing.” I looked at this beast, which I did not much want—it was very sweet, but I did not want to keep it or have the costs associated with doing so—and was told that the owner might appear. Last night we debated the perils of social media but this incident proved their power, because once the mugshot of the offending pony was plastered all over Twitter, Facebook and Snapchat the owner recognised the wandering criminal, came forward, collected it and took it home.

I wondered what would have happened if the owner had not done so. How long would I have been left with this wee beastie? If I had sent it to auction, that would in no way have met the cost of keeping it for however long was necessary. If it had had to be sent to be humanely destroyed, I certainly was not going to be the one stumping up £500 for that. The local authorities do not have the capacity to stable unwanted straying horses, the charities are at breaking point and the police certainly did not want to be lumbered with this beast, although they were keen to get it off the main road. Thankfully, it eventually went home. I cannot say that I blame the local authority or the police for not wanting it, because the costs of stabling it would have been horrendous, and over long periods, in particular, our public services and local authorities cannot be expected to sustain those, especially not in the numbers we have heard about today.

Hampshire is thought to have about 5,000 fly-grazed horses and ponies, and is second only to Surrey in that respect. Those figures were put together by the Country Land and Business Association. My hon. Friend the Member for York Outer has done sterling work in introducing the Bill, which aims to remove the ambiguities in the current law, and consolidate powers into one place and strengthen them. He has worked tirelessly to secure Government support and, given that, as he said earlier, the situation is a crisis, he has been absolutely right to do so. What we all want from this Bill is an improved welfare situation; greater clarity for local authorities so that they can more easily detain, secure and dispose of animals that are causing a hazard and being illegally grazed; an avoidance of situations where owners at the last minute remove one animal and replace it with a different one; and, importantly, a presumption that, if you can find them, the owner of the horse will be liable for damage and all associated costs.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Thursday 17th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

I know the hon. Gentleman recently raised the flooding in Maghull with the Environment Agency. Watercourses and rivers are the responsibility of the agency, but surface flooding, as he said, is the responsibility of the lead local flood authority. I have been talking to the Local Government Association about chasing all councils to ensure that their plans are in place, so that we can be as reassured about surface flooding as we are about other forms of flooding and that all the procedures are in place.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

On one of the hottest days of the year, flooding may seem a dim and distant memory, but the effects are ongoing in Romsey. Not a single Government Minister has yet been to my constituency to see what needs to be done. Will my hon. Friend care to visit Romsey to see for himself the work that desperately needs to be undertaken to safeguard the town from future flooding events?

[Dan Rogerson]

Ministers have undertaken a great number of visits across the country and I would be happy to join my hon. Friend in a visit to her constituency. She is right to point out that we are experiencing some hot weather, which brings its own challenges, but we also have the threat of storms over the weekend, so we are keeping a close eye on what might result from them.

Migratory Birds (Malta)

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Wednesday 7th May 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sir John Randall]

I do not know the exact situation, but it seems on the surface that that was not the best move.

In March, 33 MEPs from 10 member states wrote to Environment Commissioner Potocnik saying that

“the Maltese government has sought to justify the derogation through inaccurate reports and unreliable and even fictional data.”

Will the Government call on Janez Potocnik, the EU Environment Commissioner, to ensure that the directive is properly enforced in Malta?

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on securing the debate. Does he agree that the situation smacks of the European Commission having lost the will to address the problem?

[Sir John Randall]

I am not entirely sure. All I know is that the European Commissioner’s time is running out and it is not the best time to discuss such matters, so I think that we will return to them in a couple of months.

The main law that defends our shared wildlife is the EU birds directive, but a new environmental inspections directive is also under consideration. However, we cannot be too cocky. We must get our own house in order, as the illegal persecution of birds still happens in this country, including the recent killing of some red kites in Ross-shire. We cannot lecture people unless we get our house in order—although I stress that I am not trying to lecture the Maltese people.

Managing Flood Risk

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Monday 3rd March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

The issue of managing flood risk has inevitably come to the fore in my constituency. Since 24 December, some properties have been flooded not only by river water but by foul sewage. Environment Agency records show that back in 2007, Romsey, along with Winchester, was identified as one of the areas in Hampshire that were most prone to flooding.

I want to touch on some specific issues, including development, which other Members have already mentioned. We should think about development not just on the floodplains, but in the catchment areas. We should think about the impact of building yet more houses on land that has previously acted as a natural sponge. We should think about the run-off caused by more tarmac and more roof tiles.

In my constituency, during the run-up to Christmas and into the new year, significant problems were caused by surface water run-off and combined drainage systems that simply could not cope with the amount of rainfall. Since then, however, the problems have been caused not by foul drainage but by the beautiful River Test, which has burst its banks in several places, and by its carriers and tributaries. That has had an impact in many parts of my constituency, not just in Romsey.

I agree with other Members who have said that we need a coherent strategy. We cannot view Romsey in isolation from the villages further north along the river valley, because any work that is done further north will have an impact on Romsey. In the villages, I have heard many calls for dredging, for a widening of the streams and watercourses, and for better weed clearance. However, that could have the effect of sending water down to Romsey and the River Test even faster. We know that the Test has a maximum capacity of about 50 tonnes of water per second, but according to some figures it has run at 55 tonnes per second over the past few weeks. It does not take a rocket scientist to work out what will happen next: the river will flood. We need a coherent strategy that will establish ways of slowing the river down as it passes down the beautiful Test valley.

I am not an engineer and I do not pretend to have the solutions, but I think that we can work something out. Just over a week ago, I was told by the Army that it was necessary to find bits of land that could be flooded safely without affecting people’s homes and without necessarily affecting sites of special scientific interest, in a manner designed by the Environment Agency. The water needs to be slowed somewhat, so that when it arrives at Romsey—where all of it has to pass under one bridge at Mainstone—there is not a deluge but a controlled flow.

It is vital for us to use the knowledge we have gained over the past month or so. The help from the military has been invaluable, but I also pay tribute to the Environment Agency, many of whose staff have been working 24/7, literally around the clock, putting in more than 80 hours per week just to ensure that homes are kept safe and people are not flooded out. We have learnt a great deal. Aerial photographs taken in my constituency show exactly where the Test has flooded. A massive amount of work has also been done on a little-known river, the Fishlake stream. I do not think that anyone knew quite how fragile the bank of that stream was until the Friday at the beginning of February when the water started to overtop the bank and erode the outside of it. Suddenly, it became a crisis point. I do not believe that the Environment Agency identified it as such back in 2007, but we have learnt this time. We have had thousands of man hours of assistance—engineers have tried to establish the best way of preserving and protecting the bank for the future—and we have had critical lessons to learn.

I should pay tribute to a host of organisations in addition to the Environment Agency, particularly the emergency services, but also the Houghton fishing club, a wonderful riparian owner in the north of the constituency. Its members were out digging relief channels and making sure that houses in Stockbridge were protected during the critical first weekend of the flooding. There has been flooding in Stockbridge, but it has been limited to three houses. Stockbridge is a beautiful village on the banks of the Test, and many carriers run under the high street. It is phenomenal that only three houses were flooded; the situation could have been much worse had it not been for the immediate response of the fishing club, which, as an organisation that has existed for many years, knows the river better than almost any other. It was able to identify what could safely be done to create relief for the properties on the banks of some of the carriers that were in the most peril, without endangering further houses.

I also pay tribute to all those who have been involved in the multi-agency approach, and to the independent companies that have made fantastic offers of help with the flood effort. I am thinking particularly of NGS, a company in Southampton that is best known for supplying grit and salt for roads in icy weather. It donated sand for sandbags at a critical time, just as Romsey had established that an additional 40,000 sandbags were needed. I gather that about 80,000 sandbags have now been laid down in the affected part of the borough, thanks to a phenomenal effort. Travelling around the constituency over the weekend, I saw areas where the provision of sandbags was still essential.

On the banks of the Test, the groundwater-fed river is causing a considerable problem. Water levels are still rising, and groundwater springs are still popping up in places where they have never appeared in the past. The village of King’s Somborne, for example, has a wonderful stream passing through it, but that stream is overflowing into many houses across roads, and has made it incredibly difficult for people to get out just in order to buy essentials. Many businesses such as village pubs and shops, which are critical to village life, are unable to trade, having found themselves under several inches or even feet of water.

I echo the call made by my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart). Businesses need to know how to apply for funds: they need the forms. I know that Test Valley borough council has done great work in putting information on its website, but when the applications are made, it will be imperative for funds to arrive, and to arrive quickly.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does she agree that, as well as the businesses that she has mentioned—which, of course, need all the help we can give them—there are businesses that have been cut off and very badly affected by flooding, although they may not have had floodwater inside their premises? I welcome the £10 million that the Government have already set aside to help those businesses, but does my hon. Friend agree that even more may be needed?

[Caroline Nokes]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is an industrial estate in Budds lane in my constituency. Budds lane was horrendously flooded. The emergency services had to shut the Greatbridge road because of the depth of water, yet some businesses in the industrial estate were dry. There was no access to them, however, so there was no passing trade, and they could not get their staff into work, but the business itself was not affected by floodwater.

I want to conclude with a plea. Almost inevitably, it comes from the lead flood authority, Hampshire flood authority, and it refers specifically to the flood defence grant in aid. The deadline for the submission to Government is incredibly tight. It was moved from 3 March out to 12 March, but that is only next week, and there are concerns that what will happen as a result is that the most developed and worked-up schemes will be submitted, which might not necessarily be the schemes that would best protect the villages in my constituency or Romsey itself. That is a very real concern, because what we have learned over the past three and a half weeks is where the crisis points are. We perhaps did not know in detail where they were previously, but we do now. It is absolutely critical that the areas which need the help most, in that they need the most investment to prevent future flooding, are the ones that get it. We need to have not simply the schemes that are furthest down the pipeline, but the ones that address where there is the biggest point of crisis.

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

indicated assent.

[Caroline Nokes]

I see the Minister nodding, and I hope he will heed that well, because there is a significant concern in the county council that that might not be the case and that the 12 March deadline is incredibly tight. We in Hampshire have had a significant problem not just with river flooding, but with ground water; as we are a county that is rich in chalk, we inevitably get a lot of groundwater springs. There is surface water run-off which has caused massive problems in my constituency and elsewhere in the county and, of course, we have had problems with foul drainage.

I have in my inbox numerous e-mails from constituents who have been suffering flooding since 24 December—Christmas eve. I would like the Minister to contemplate for one moment what it must be like to be flooded out of one’s house by sewage on Christmas eve, and to be looking at the repairs and considering the future when, in February, the River Test rushes in and undoes all the drying that has occurred up until that point. I have many residents who find themselves in that situation. They are unsurprisingly desperate. They are deeply concerned and unhappy. They are lacking in confidence about whether they will ever be able to reinsure their homes. They welcome the Government’s Flood Re scheme, but in a beautiful river valley such as the one we have in Hampshire many of the properties are inevitably in the highest council tax band and many of them are damaged beyond repair and facing potential demolition and rebuild, and their residents want some answers on whether they will be able to be covered by Flood Re if technically the house is a replacement and a new building, not one that has just been repaired.

I would welcome any answers the Minister is able to give on that front and I appreciate having had this opportunity to speak once more about the flooding in Hampshire, which, sadly, has not attracted the same coverage as the flooding in Somerset or the Thames valley.

Flooding

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Wednesday 26th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

Romsey is located on the banks of the River Test, a world-renowned chalk stream. Too many times in the past few months the river has been an unwelcome visitor in too many people’s homes. Our problem is not just the river, which is ground fed, but the springs that have popped up in many places; the ingress of groundwater into the foul drainage systems, causing the drains to fail and rivers of sewage to flow through the streets of villages like Chilbolton and Longparish; and surface water flooding, which we experienced in Romsey from Christmas eve until well into the new year. For householders along the Causeway in Romsey, there have been weeks of misery: homes being permanently pumped out, an access road undermined by the sheer weight of water, and the fear that access to the crucial pumping station for the town would not be maintained.

The situation has not all been negative, however. There have been phenomenal examples of community spirit and pulling together in a crisis. I have praised them before, but I will do so again: Romsey’s amazing retained firefighters gave up much of their Christmas and were among the first to be out there again when the February floods hit. They were indefatigably cheerful, even when their road closures signs were ignored and damaged. The Army and the Navy arrived in Romsey the week before last and designed the most amazing device—colloquially known as the “cat flap”—to divert water from Fishlake stream back into the main body of the River Test, and to lay 40,000 sandbags at strategic points around the town. They worked seamlessly with the borough and county councils, the Environment Agency and the emergency services, and were greeted with relief wherever they went.

However much I wax lyrical on how things were pulled together to aid Romsey and the surrounding villages in their hour of need, there are crucial lessons that we must learn. Little was known about the bank of the Fishlake stream until it was at crisis point, so work to identify at-risk areas has to happen and it has to happen now. There are some great local examples across Hampshire of communities with flood action plans and flood wardens where greater damage was averted. We now have to replicate that work everywhere.

People have spoken at length of the dangers of building on floodplains, and I agree. However, in many instances the houses are already there, so although we must avoid adding to that housing stock, we simply cannot abandon the houses already there. Protection is needed, and although I do not pretend to be an engineer or a drainage expert, when the water has subsided, we must work out what can best be done to avoid this happening again. Sadly, in many parts of my constituency the water is still rising, particularly the groundwater, unlike around the River Itchen where the water levels are falling.

When it comes to planning, we have to look at the existing infrastructure and the impact on surface water drainage from having additional roof tiles in previously open green spaces that acted as natural sponges to rainfall. I echo the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Tewkesbury (Mr Robertson), who is no longer in his place, but we cannot look just at floodplains. We have to look at the catchment areas, which can also make a contribution. Where there has been development at Abbotswood on the edge of Romsey—a significant distance and uphill from the natural floodplain—there is a clear problem with surface water drainage flooding existing properties that are further down the hill. Over Christmas and new year there were huge problems in Winchester road in Romsey, with a combined drainage system simply overwhelmed by the amount of water, causing foul drainage flooding of homes. That might be regarded as totally separate to the subsequent flooding caused by the River Test, but the misery for residents is no less.

I spent last Saturday morning looking at the defences that the military and the Environment Agency have put in place to prevent further flooding in Romsey from the fragile bank of the Fishlake stream. I would like to put on record my thanks to Lieutenant Colonel Fossey and his team, who worked phenomenally hard to protect the town from further flooding. As one would expect, conversation inevitably turned to the future and what needs to be done to safeguard Romsey in the long term. I am the first to say that now is not the time for a knee-jerk reaction when deciding what would be best. The local authorities and the Environment Agency need to assemble experts and decide, not at a time of crisis but when the waters have abated somewhat, and they need reasonable time scales in which to do it.

There are certainly some thoughts already on whether land needs to be found that can be safely flooded without damage to housing. Attention needs to be turned to development and where new houses can best be placed away from floodplains in a way that will not impact on already creaking infrastructure. If necessary, we need to revisit housing numbers and perhaps take a view that some areas simply cannot accommodate more building. The water courses and drainage systems further up the Test valley from Romsey also need to be considered. I do not know whether extra capacity or deepening and widening the stream through King’s Somborne or the Wallop brook would help. Presumably that would run the risk of sending water further downstream to Romsey even faster and exacerbating the problems there.

Longparish, Chilbolton and King’s Somborne have all had 24/7 tankering operations to clear surface water from the drainage system, but it is a drop in the ocean. There are still people in Longparish and Chilbolton who cannot flush their loos, have a shower or wash their clothes, and this is Hampshire in the 21st century. I appreciate that the solution will be expensive and require careful planning, but if we are to experience longer, wetter winters in future and if this year is just a taste of what is to come, we have no choice.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Thursday 13th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dan Rogerson]

That is a very good question from the Whips, but the answer is that the current price review period mechanism was put in place under the previous Government. As I have already set out, prices will be held at the first opportunity, and some companies are reducing them in what remains of this period. We will see savings in the next price review period compared with the prices forecast had we carried on with the price review left to us by Labour.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

Two days ago, Southern Water announced its price rises for 2014-15 at a time when they are tankering in many parts of Romsey and villages throughout the Test valley to ensure that homes are safe from ingress of sewage. Please will the Minister assure me that he will work with Southern Water to ensure that this winter’s expenditure will not negatively impact bills in future?

[Dan Rogerson]

Ofwat works with companies to consider what is a reasonable amount for them to charge, and it will take into account all the costs that companies face. The key thing is that as we continue to invest in flood defences and deal with some of the problems, the sorts of issues that we face at the moment should have less of an impact on the water companies. I pay tribute to water companies for doing what they are to continue to provide service in these extreme weather conditions. I visited a water treatment plant yesterday to see how it is being defended and it is working well and its staff are working incredibly hard.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Thursday 9th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Paterson]

I know that those in the Labour Whips Office struggle with slow learners, but I shall put it on the record again: this Government are providing more than any previous Government in the current spending review. We are spending £2.3 billion, which is in addition to £148 million of partnership money. Exceptionally, the present Government have a £2.3 billion programme of capital spending up to 2021. Will Labour Members please ask those on their Front Bench to endorse that spending programme?

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

In parts of rural Hampshire, the cost of high-speed broadband runs to many thousands of pounds per connection. Can my hon. Friend reassure those living in villages such as Barton Stacey that resources from, for instance, the rural community broadband fund might provide them with high-speed connections?

[Dan Rogerson]

My hon. Friend is right to refer to the benefits of broadband connections to the rural economy. Through the work that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport is doing with Broadband Delivery UK, and also through the rural community broadband fund, we are providing resources that will deliver projects in locations such as the one to which she referred. Some 10,000 properties a week are already being connected to superfast broadband, and we expect the figure to rise to about 40,000 a week by the summer.

Flooding

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Monday 6th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Paterson]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. We have the conundrum that we must protect agricultural land that is of a lower value than land on which property is built and land in the cities. Of course, the risk that lives will be lost is also lower than in cities. The Environment Agency faces that conundrum. There is a matrix to evaluate each project. The Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall, and I are more than happy to talk to him about the details of the case that he mentions.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

Romsey has been very badly affected over the past fortnight by high levels in the River Test, massive surface water run-off and, most particularly, effluent from a Victorian drainage system that simply cannot cope. My huge thanks go to Romsey’s retained firefighters who worked to pump out houses. Will my right hon. Friend assure me that he will work closely with colleagues in the Department for Communities and Local Government to look at areas where housing development is planned on greenfield sites, but where there is already a problem with drainage systems that cannot cope?

[Mr Paterson]

My hon. Friend raises a very important point. It is completely crazy to have new housing projects that do not have adequate drainage for the conditions. The Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall, is listening carefully. As we go through the review, she might like to write to him with her recommendations.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Richard Benyon]

We certainly remain willing to work across Government to ensure that those kinds of concerns about the undoubted impacts are raised. There is huge experience in relation to other infrastructure developments that have taken place over recent years and decades, and I can assure my hon. Friend that we will work closely with him to get this right.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

7. What steps he is taking to improve the horse passport system.

[The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mr Owen Paterson)]

The Government remain committed to strengthening the horse passport system. I met members of the Equine Sector Council for Health and Welfare’s strategy steering committee to discuss this and other issues on 21 February. My noble Friend Lord de Mauley will be meeting them again next week to discuss these matters further.

[Caroline Nokes]

A single horse passport-issuing organisation could improve traceability and bring greater rigour to the system. What transitional arrangements is my right hon. Friend planning for the more than 1 million horses in this country that already have passports and that are far more likely to end up at slaughterhouses than next year’s foals?

[Mr Paterson]

My hon. Friend speaks with real authority on this matter, having been chief executive of the National Pony Society before entering the House. That is one of the 75 bodies that issues horse passports. She makes the very sensible point that more than 1 million passports have already been issued. We are working with the European Commission, which has sensibly suggested that we move to a single database, and we will obviously work closely with the passport-issuing organisations as we work out the transition to the new system.

Responsible Dog Ownership

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Tuesday 26th February 2013 Westminster Hall

[Ian Lavery]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I have mentioned dog breeding, but only slightly, and I agree fully with those sentiments. There are so many issues involved in responsible dog ownership. That is a main issue, and I hope to cover the rest later in my contribution.

The first of the three main issues arising from the written ministerial statement was a requirement that dogs be microchipped with the owner’s details. The second was a change in the criminal law, in section 3 of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991, to extend the offence of a dog being dangerously out of control to all places, including private property. The third was to allow owners of dogs seized as suspected dangerous dogs or prohibited types to retain possession of their dogs until the outcome of court proceedings.

The Secretary of State said that microchipping makes a clear link between a dog and its owner. More than 100,000 dogs stray, are lost or are stolen each year, and many must be kept in kennels before being re-homed. A microchip allows them to be reunited quickly with their owners, reducing stress for dog and owner alike. It will also lead to substantial savings for local authorities and welfare charities, which spend some £57 million a year on kennelling costs, and will mean that fewer dogs are destroyed. Up to 6,000 are put down each year because their owners cannot be found.

The Government announced the introduction of regulations to require the microchipping of all dogs in England from 6 April 2016. After that date, owners will need to have their dog microchipped and registered on one of the authorised commercial databases available, and they will have to register the details of any new owner before they sell or give away a dog. Owners will be required to keep their contact details up to date on the microchip databases.

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. I fear that I might be about to incur the wrath of the Chair, but does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is imperative that any database, and the registration of changes of ownership, must be absolutely robust so that we do not end up with a situation like the passporting of horses? There are 75 passport issuing organisations, and nobody has confidence that a given microchip and passport link to the right horse. Does he agree that in the case of dogs, we must ensure that the system is absolutely robust?

[Ian Lavery]

Yes, of course. I fully agree, and will probably cover the issue in the next few minutes. If we are to have microchipping, it is extremely important that it is absolutely robust and foolproof. If we cannot guarantee that, we will be wasting our time.

The progress made on microchipping has been well received by all parties; it is one of the most important parts of the statement. There is still a lack of clarity, and some might say an undoubted dragging of feet, on the potential introduction of legislation in 2016.

In the Minister’s response, I should be delighted to hear further clarity on microchipping: the age at which dogs will be required to be microchipped, whether there will be any exemptions, how the law will be enforced, who will carry out the enforcement of the law and how it will be funded. Does the Minister expect enforcement to be proactive or reactive? Will microchipping a dog actually prove ownership of the animal? That is important. If a local authority receives a stray dog that is not microchipped, and if it is not claimed but in kennels, will the local authority be able to microchip the dog and re-home it? Will the requirement to keep contact details up to date on the database be cheap for dog owners? Will there be a maximum fee, to ensure that the introduction of microchipping, although most welcome, is not cost-prohibitive for many people? A lot of vulnerable people have dogs and cherish them. What education and awareness- raising will DEFRA do over the next two years to encourage compliance with the microchipping regime?

The second major issue is the suggested amendment of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991. Extending section 3 to cover all places, including private property, is a major step forward, and will be welcomed on both sides of the House. It will extend the law and give better protection to people in their own homes, as well as to those I mentioned previously who enter private property, such as postal workers. Again, however, more clarity is required. For example, will the extension cover going inside a private dwelling, or will it remain at the front door and just cover the front garden? What private property will the law cover? Will there be a defence for dog owners protecting their property and, if so, what will it be?

Any amendment is important because the legislation is important. To effect the change in the law, DEFRA is to introduce amendments to the Dangerous Dogs Act as soon as parliamentary time permits. Put simply, there is not much disagreement in the Chamber this morning, but I disagree about the timing: it is not good enough to say that the legislative changes on private property will be introduced when there is parliamentary time. We need a guarantee that the legislation will be introduced at least in this Parliament. Indeed, we need to ensure that the legislation is introduced as soon as possible—this week would be fine as far as many people up and down the country are concerned. The Dangerous Dogs Act is seen by many as extremely poor legislation and as wholly ineffective, so it would be better to have consolidated legislation covering everything, rather than tinkering with other pieces of legislation.

The third major issue is the seizure and kennelling of suspected dangerous dogs. To ensure the welfare of suspected prohibited dogs that have become the subject of court proceedings and to ease the substantial cost to the police service, the Government have decided that the police will no longer need to seize and kennel such dogs pending the outcome of court proceedings if they do not consider the dog to present a risk to the public. The police will have the discretion to release a suspected prohibited dog when they are completely satisfied that it is in the care of a responsible owner. They will be allowed to put extra restrictions on the owner, such as requiring the dog to be muzzled and on a lead when in public. Such changes will be made by way of amendment to the exemption scheme, and can be done through secondary legislation. Someone mentioned this being the animal equivalent of an antisocial behaviour order, an ASBO, suggesting it should be a DOGBO. I have not seen that before, and I am not personally convinced, but the cross-party line is fully supportive.

The Government consider that allowing suspected prohibited dogs to be exempted from seizure in those circumstances strikes the right balance between protecting the public from potentially dangerous dogs and ensuring that the dogs are safely and properly looked after and not unnecessarily removed from their homes. There needs to be clarity on the issue. I am concerned that one or two dogs might slip through the net. I am not sure that the police are properly qualified to identify vicious or dangerous dogs. A beautiful white poodle could be totally vicious, and the biggest dog in the world could be quite placid and not vicious at all. Let us be honest about that: categorisation is difficult. The police are extremely talented at deciding about individuals and personalities from how they react, but I am not sure that they are well qualified to determine which dogs may be vicious and what owners must do to retain possession of their dog during a court case, if indeed they want to.

Further clarity is required. For example, is the Government’s proposal to allow dogs to remain with their owners effective at the point of potential seizure, or at the discretion of the police once the dog has been seized and kept in kennels? Has DEFRA made an estimate of the percentage of dogs seized each year that are likely to be affected by the proposal? If so, what is that percentage and how did the Department arrive at it? Why has DEFRA not looked at the court processes more closely, to require a time limit on expert witness exams for all dogs seized? I have already posed a whole number of questions, to which I have added more, but many issues need clarification, probably on all sides, to continue constructive dialogue.

With the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee highlighting the need for a more fundamental approach to dog control, will the Government commit to updating and consolidating all dog control legislation? Will DEFRA commit to asking the Law Commission to conduct a review into dog control legislation, as per the Select Committee recommendations? Will DEFRA be providing any new money for training and education? The money that was mentioned in the written statement and subsequently, which I have not discussed yet, appears to have been spent already, as far as the Opposition can see. There is no new money.

I want to place on record my congratulations to my own authority, Northumberland county council: the public protection service’s animal welfare team has been awarded a gold footprint in this year’s RSPCA community animal welfare footprints scheme. The team at Northumberland county council ensure the highest standards of stray dog welfare during the collection and kennelling process; they carry out proactive work to educate owners and preventive measures to reduce strain and long-term stays. Although some north-east councils have achieved the silver and bronze awards, Northumberland was the only council in the north-east to achieve the gold footprint award in 2012, so good on it. It is good to see that in my region we are being proactive in putting the right resources into responsible dog ownership.

Members might be aware that I have an interest in greyhounds—indeed, I have owned and raced a number of them in recent years, with varying success—and I have been a very responsible owner. The greyhound is a truly remarkable athlete. It is one of the oldest breeds in the world: it is mentioned in the Bible, in Chaucer and in Shakespeare, no less. It is arguably the most protected of all canine breeds. The introduction of the Welfare of Racing Greyhounds Regulations 2010 under the Animal Welfare Act 2006 was a major advance, helping to raise welfare standards across greyhound racing, and we can take a leaf out of that book. All the 30 or so greyhound tracks in England must be licensed and inspected, as must their owners and their owners’ properties. That is about responsible ownership. The Greyhound Board of Great Britain is the regulator and looks after greyhounds’ welfare in the UK.