Cat Welfare

John Howell Excerpts

Tuesday 11th December 2018 Westminster Hall

[Rehman Chishti]

I completely agree. The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has done some brilliant work, but we have an immense amount more to do. I also agree on the first point. The hon. Gentleman has an amazing wife, who made him become a cat lover and animal lover. I am not married yet, but if I get married, I will need somebody who likes cats, so that we can get a cat. Coming in and out of London, I do not have time to have a cat; we are talking about animal welfare, and cats must be given time. That is key. His point about supporting and doing the right thing as parliamentarians—not simply talking about something but pushing for the right framework to be put in place—is absolutely right.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend acknowledge the role that cats play in the social fabric of our society, particularly for the elderly or vulnerable? They play a vital role in providing the comfort and companionship that those people are looking for.

[Rehman Chishti]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. He will have seen the PDSA’s PAW report, which talked about cats’ five welfare needs, one of which is companionship. We talk about loneliness and the Government doing the right thing and people having the required environment to be happy, and what cats and animals do is absolutely amazing, so he makes a valid point.

My first point is about the compulsory microchipping of cats. I spoke to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on 25 October. He said that the proposals in my presentation Bill on the compulsory microchipping of cats and ensuring that car accidents involving cats are reported, as they are when dogs are involved, were very reasonable, and that he would ask his civil servants to look into the matter. I take the Secretary of State at his word, and if he says that the proposals are very reasonable, it therefore means that to do the opposite would be very unreasonable.

In the light of the Secretary of State’s commitment and his saying that the proposals are very reasonable, I ask the Minister: are cats less important than dogs? A statutory instrument requiring dogs to be compulsorily microchipped was introduced in 2015, so there does not need to be primary legislation; such a change could be done through a statutory instrument. At the time it was said that such a change would be done with dogs first to see how the process worked, and that extending it further would then be looked at. That was in 2015. I know that the Government and Parliament work slowly, but three years to see how a system works is long enough.

I know the Minister. He and I have been here for the same amount of time—eight years. He is a wonderful man who cares passionately about animal welfare and doing the right thing, and he listens to what people have to say. A petition on change.org, “Help me to change the law for Cats involved in RTA’s”, received 377,000 signatures. A parliamentary petition about microchipping had 33,413 signatures. A petition to introduce compulsory microchip scanning for vets, rescues and authorities had 70,800 signatures. That demonstrates that people out there want Parliament to do the right thing, as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) says is our duty. Ministers can see the public interest in this area through the petitions put forward and the contributions of Members today and in previous debates.