Sale of Puppies

David Drew Excerpts

Monday 21st May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am delighted to serve under your chairing, Sir Roger, even though you would rather be on this side of the room talking in the debate. I know you feel passionately about it, as does Mr Austin, who was in the Chair before you. I congratulate the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Martyn Day), who carefully introduced the debate. We have also heard contributions from the hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Andrea Jenkyns), my right hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd), and the hon. Members for Clacton (Giles Watling), for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine), for Aberdeen South (Ross Thomson), for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant), and the SNP spokesperson—I will try and get her constituency name right—the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow (Dr Cameron). I am pleased to see the Minister in his place.

This is a debate in which we largely agree, so I will not take up time agreeing with hon. Members who made passionate contributions on what is—let us be honest—heinous animal cruelty, and one of the worst, because it is about making money. It is in no way about trying to provide a supply of animals for which there is a demand.

I was shocked by the figure of how many registered providers there are—only 12%, and about 70% of what is provided—so the vast majority of people get their pets through fairly dodgy provision, and the simple fact is that, unless the Minister can tell us, we do not know how many people are out there operating. That is an awful thing to say, and it is because many of them do not operate in this country at all. As has been said, they operate through the south of Ireland and eastern Europe, so the animals get here after the most perilous of journeys. One presumes that many do not get here at all because they suffer in transit.

I agree with what has been said. I will not go through some of the more gory stories, but we have to recognise that they are there and take them up. I hope the Minister will take away from the debate the need for action. Most of us agree on the need for a ban. Regulation is always called for, but a complete ban seems to be the way forward in this case. Labour would support that as part of an animal welfare Act, which could likewise deal with other evils out there. As always, I am aware that it could become a Christmas tree Bill, which we stick on things to ban—we all have our favourites—but that would be appropriate in this case because people feel passionately about it.

I thank those who introduced the petition and who support Lucy’s law. The message is that the Government need to act quickly and comprehensively, because this is a trade that should not be allowed to continue in the way that it has. Puppy smuggling is one of those animal welfare issues about which one thinks, “Why does anyone do it?” As I say, they do it purely because they want to make money. There is no other reason why the trade continues.

The Animal and Plant Health Agency has done some sterling work, alongside the Dog’s Trust. I thank the Dog’s Trust, Battersea Dogs Home, Cats Protection, various other organisations and other private contributors, who have given me lots of information, which I do not intend to impart. We all know that this is a well-trailed area. It is known exactly what is going on and what should be going on.

Sadly, where the Government have acted—for instance, with the pet travel scheme—there is evidence that it has not helped, because people have perhaps used that as a device to bring in animals where other means would not have been allowed. Of course, we would strongly argue that we need additional border guards. Whatever one’s view on Brexit—no doubt the Minister and I will debate Brexit again—we need to patrol and maintain our borders, because this unacceptable trade goes on daily. Whatever we feel about a ban, we could do more to crack down on what is coming through, because it is clearly unacceptable. I hope the Minister will say something about that. Surely we must have a means to deal with that, notwithstanding the need for a ban on the third-party provision of puppies, as well as cats and other animals, as has been said. It is not just puppies; we could get into rabbits, guinea pigs and so on. Sadly, these animals are being abused, because they are being bred purely for the worst of reasons.

International studies have shown that puppies obtained from pet shops have, as has been said, a lower life expectancy than other puppies and suffer much more from disease. That is made worse if they come here from other parts of the world, as they have already faced the problems of transit. Labour would support banning third-party sales, and we hope we can get on with it. It is no good just promising it; people now expect us to take action through Parliament, so we cannot allow a delay, and obviously this is also about welfare standards, traceability, transparency and accountability.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

What does my hon. Friend think would be the right sanction for those who broke a ban? Does he feel that they should face a custodial sentence or a fine? I want to ask the Minister the same question when he speaks, but I would like to hear from the shadow Minister first.

[Dr Drew]

I could have done with advance warning. That is a bit unfair; we are supposed to be on the same side. I think we should have strong sanctions in this area. It is not just a question of banning people from taking part in this trade; we should have the toughest sanctions. This is about animal cruelty. This is as bad as dogfighting or some of the cruelties inflicted on horses left in the worst possible conditions through the winter. It is awful and, as a nation of animal lovers, we should feel strongly about it, so I hope there will be the possibility of criminal sanctions, because these people are acting criminally. This is not some minor trade; people make serious money out of it, so they should be dealt with by the full force of the law, because of how these animals are bred and how they are kept, in the worst of conditions.

The sad thing is that these are often the animals that are bought as pets but end up in the shelters or rescue centres because of their health problems and other problems. Many of the wonderful voluntary organisations in this sector are full to bursting, because of these animals that have been discarded. Again, it would seem sensible to investigate further where those animals come from before they arrive in our shelters, because that is a serious worry. Whenever staff from the Battersea Dogs and Cats Home come here and talk to us, they say that they cannot take any more animals. They are forever having to make difficult decisions about how many animals they can keep, because they are inundated with people who think it is fun to have a pet for three or four months, but then realise that they cannot look after it and so dispose of it. Hon. Members have said this, but we need to think about the education process—“A dog isn’t just for Christmas, it’s for life”. People need to understand that it is a lifetime commitment.

This is also about resources, and I totally agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith), who asked where the resources are. It is no good having a ban if we do not enforce it or follow it up with prosecutions and so on.

I will make a final couple of points. As for this idea that people should take an animal only if it is with its mother and has clearly been bred through that particular animal, it is difficult to tell that, but registered and properly run breeders would pride themselves on providing that information, and they would be able to prove it. In a sense, they would have to be able to license themselves, by showing that a puppy was the offspring of the mother. That is where the care and the proper breeding process could be seen in its entirety.

As I have said, we are not talking about Brexit today, but it would be interesting to know whether we could go ahead and introduce a ban without having to go through all the EU regulations, because clearly elements of this are subject to EU oversight.

To conclude, I hope the Minister will say that this is something we all agree on. There is a consultation, but one hopes that everyone is saying that a ban is appropriate and can be progressed, and so we just need to get on with this, rather than waiting. We would prefer a ban as part of an overall animal welfare Bill, but it might be something we could introduce because of the level of agreement that exists, because of the harm being done and because of the duplicity involved. People end up with these pets, thinking they are doing something good for themselves and their children, when all they are really doing is fuelling this terrible trade. If we could get some clarity on where the Government are going on this, we will give our support in terms of any time that is necessary, but a ban is right, a ban is appropriate and a ban is needed.

--- Later in debate ---

[George Eustice]

We have made it clear that our intention is to raise the maximum penalty for animal cruelty offences—the most sickening offences that take place—to five years. As part of our work on that, we will of course want to look at the approach taken by other parts of the UK and any lessons we might be able to learn from that.

We published a draft Bill in December. It will allow the courts to set realistic sentences for the extreme cases of animal cruelty that I know sicken all right-minded people, including every Member participating in this debate. We will seek an appropriate opportunity to bring forward the legislation to make that change.

I want to touch briefly on another contentious issue, which is the use of electronic training collars for dogs and cats. This is another area where we have been doing some work. We have recently completed a public consultation on a proposal to ban the use of such devices. It closed on 27 April, and we received around 7,500 responses, which we are analysing. There was a very high response rate, and the consultation sparked passionate views on both sides of the containment fence. We will consider those representations and announce further steps in due course.

[Dr Drew]

A number of Members talked about education. Will DEFRA launch an education programme to explain to the public that they should buy puppies only through licensed breeders? I know it is a very small part of the overall supply of puppies, but that would be a simple thing for DEFRA to do, although it may cost money. Will the Minister say whether that is something it will do?

[George Eustice]

We publicise any way we can the existing regulations, including the guidance that people should see puppies with their mother before purchasing them. That is long-standing DEFRA guidance. About two years ago, I had a discussion with some of the pet food manufacturers to try to persuade them that they should add this guidance to some of their packaging so that people who were considering buying pets would be reminded of it. I could not get the manufacturers to take up my suggestion, but it was worth a try. The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. If we introduced a change in the law, we would ensure we did everything we could to publicise that.

Finally on enforcement—a number of Members raised the issue—we have provided in our new licensing conditions for local authorities to be able to go for full cost recovery to fund their work in this area. While the internet provides many challenges, it also provides a relatively easy way to identify people selling pets in the UK who are not legally entitled to do so.