Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill

David Johnston Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 23rd October 2020 Commons Chamber

[David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) on bringing this good Bill to the House. Given that we get so many emails on so many campaigns every week and month, it is nice to be saying, for once, “Yes, I agree”, rather than the usual, “No, I don’t”.

About 15 years ago, I was involved in a project looking at charitable giving, comparing the UK and other countries. There were some notable differences between the UK and the US. People in the US tended to give more money to charity than people in the UK. When we talked to the wealthy about why that was, there was a feeling here that they paid higher taxes and it was government’s job to sort out the various issues that charities were focusing on with that tax money. In the US, they were much more likely to give money to local causes, with a feeling that charity began at home, whereas in the UK they were much more likely to give it to international organisations. One of the biggest differences between charitable giving in the UK and such giving in almost every other country was the amount given to animal charities, which is always one of the highest proportions of charitable giving; the project I refer to was about 15 years ago, but that has always been consistent. Giving to animal charities has often been at the top, along with giving to health charities—those are usually the top two. That says something important about the UK’s relationship to animals. Some people in this country love animals as much as people, and we probably all know individuals who love animals more than they love people. So it is right that we are introducing this legislation.

Animals run through a lot of aspects of life in my constituency of Wantage and Didcot, including, of course, as pets. How often someone sees me might depend on how nice their pet is. I really like our friends Juliet and Jeremy, but I really love their dog Mabel. Animals run though businesses; we have a small brewery in our constituency called LoveBeer, where all the beers are named after dogs—their dogs and the dogs of people they know. People can buy beers such as Purdy Peculiar and Doctor Roo. Ours is a rural constituency, so animals run through the farms. We have a lot of farms and people cannot drive far through the constituency without seeing animals on farms. Of course, animals are a factor in crime as well; like many rural constituencies, we face an issue of hare coursing, which is covered by different legislation.

It is fair to say that our maximum sentences for animal cruelty have been out of kilter, both with how the country feels about animals and with the maximum sentences in other countries. It is right that we are going from having one of the lowest maximum sentences to having one of the highest in the world. It is also right that we remedy some of the inconsistencies about a dog harming a service dog incurring a higher sentence than a human being harming a dog.

In preparing to speak in this debate, I did as I usually do and spoke to some of the organisations with expertise on these issues. Charney Romanian Rescue Dogs in Faringdon completely supports this Bill. The Oxfordshire Animal Sanctuary, which is not in my constituency but has a presence in it, also completely supports this Bill.

Another organisation that supports the Bill is the Island Farm donkey sanctuary, which is one of the leading donkey sanctuaries in the UK, and probably in Europe. Indeed, it has more than 120 donkeys from all across Europe. The people there do a great job. Periodically, they receive a donkey whose limbs have been slashed with a knife. They had a donkey called Midge whose four front teeth had been knocked out because Midge had been hit full in the face with either a hammer or a piece of wood—they are unsure which. They do a great job and can repair donkeys physically in a matter of months, but the mental damage takes a good deal longer. They have donkeys who have been there for years and years who are still nervous when humans approach them.

I agree with all the comments that have been made about it being a mark of a civilised society to treat animals well and to punish those who do not treat animals well. It is clear why charitable giving to animal charities is as high as it is. Because of the tales of those donkeys and all the other tales of animal abuse that we have heard in the House today, I strongly support the Bill.