Wild Animals (Circuses)

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Thursday 23rd June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) (Con)]

I pay my respects to my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mark Pritchard), whom I cannot see in the Chamber, and congratulate him on securing this important debate.

I should like to put it on the record that I am grateful that we will now have a free vote. Applying a three-line Whip to an issue such as this would have made a mockery of the relationship between Parliament and the Government. That is a welcome move in the past couple of hours.

I shall not pretend that this is the biggest animal welfare issue, because it clearly is not. There are 30 or 40 wild animals in circuses in this country. That does not compare with the millions of animals that have to experience daily the brutality and horrors of factory farming. This is none the less an important issue. There is no justifiable reason for keeping animals such as elephants, tigers, lions and so on in small, travelling cages, away from any semblance of what for them would be a normal life. That is just not civilised.

My understanding is that until recently the Government took the same view, but that that changed somewhere along the line. It is hard for me—and, I believe, many others—to understand why that happened. For one thing, the vast majority of people support a ban. All the polls suggest that. The public appetite for such entertainment is, at best, fading. It is certainly not a growth sector.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

With overwhelming public opinion against the use of animals, might such a ban help circuses, because it could attract customers who, like me, are appalled by the use of wild animals, back to them?

[Zac Goldsmith]

That is an extremely valuable point. I have been to circuses in this country, but I have made a point of choosing to go only to those that I know use no wild animals. It would be nice not to have to do that research. I am sure that many people are repelled for that reason.

Waste Review

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Spelman]

I have made it clear that the coalition consists of two parties that struck an agreement, including on provisions relating to waste, which we are fulfilling today. I have set that out very clearly.

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

In stark contrast to the strong-arm tactics of the previous Government, in what ways has the Secretary of State encouraged incentives to drive up recycling rates?

[Mrs Spelman]

Absolutely. This is such an important point. The previous Government, with their punitive approach, lost public confidence by punishing a little old lady for making the genuine mistake of putting the wrong waste in a recycling container. They lost the plot. Today, we are restoring a proportionate response to the penalties that should apply and are going after the real waste criminals.

Biodiversity

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2010 Westminster Hall

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Crausby, for the opportunity to speak in this crucial debate. I must confess that I do not share the expertise of the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), but I do have a huge interest in the matter under discussion, and the residents I represent often write to me on issues connected with it. He made some excellent points about the need to quantify the environmental benefits and values of forest ecosystems and habitat projects—he referred to their “true value”—and I certainly support that principle. I hope that the Minister will give it much consideration.

I will use this opportunity to talk specifically about my experiences in my constituency. Before I became its Member of Parliament, I represented its northern sector—the Abbey Meads ward—for 10 years. The area is a new development, although it is sometimes unkindly referred to as a concrete jungle, and that relates to the points that I shall speak about. During the 10 years in which I represented that new development, the number of houses in it went from 1,800 to 8,000. As a result of that, the key principle that I developed was that sufficient provision needs to be put in place at the beginning, rather than retrospectively. It is impossible to lower the density of the housing now and to put in sufficient provision.

In my maiden speech I touched on the quality-of-life aspects of green and open spaces, and the issue comes up time and again. From a planning perspective, my concern is that developers and councils are too often allowed to tick boxes and to pay lip service to making sufficient provision. That is not acceptable, and a lot more thought needs to be put into doing things more appropriately.

There are two areas that we can focus on. One is making a lot of areas more open and accessible by pooling more of them. We could have community forests, and the local community could take ownership, come along, enjoy the benefits and learn about these things. We can also raise understanding through education and first-hand experience. I have noticed that in my constituency several schools are leading by example, and turning part of their land over to the development of their own projects, to give schoolchildren the relevant first-hand experience at a young age. I visited two such projects at St. Francis and Orchid Vale primary schools, and it is an excellent approach. I know about that from experience, because school geography lessons encouraged me to take an interest, and that is how we shall educate future generations.

To return to my original point, while we continue in this country to build on green open space we must get sufficient and correct provision now, because it cannot be done retrospectively. Let us proceed in such a way that communities will welcome and benefit from that. When we come to estimate the true value, several more tick boxes will become important, which I would fully support.