Animal Welfare: Tourist Attractions, Activities and Experiences Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Watts
Main Page: Lord Watts (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Watts's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(2 years, 5 months ago)
Lords ChamberIt is an important point and in fact, to give it credit, the Association of British Travel Agents—ABTA—has updated and published guidelines on a whole range of activities which it classes as unacceptable, and its definition is fairly closely aligned with that of many of the organisations that focus on this issue. It is a voluntary set of guidelines—what we are talking about today is something that will be harder than that, something mandatory—but it is worth acknowledging the steps that the industry is already taking.
My Lords, why are the Government so poor at managing their legislation programme? Every week, Ministers come forward and say that they are committed to something but they have not got a timeline for it. Is it not about time the Government got their act together and sorted out their legislation programme?
This is a question that goes way beyond my own pay grade. All I can tell the noble Lord is that I am working very hard to bring the full range of animal welfare measures that we have been discussing now for a couple of years. I would also remind the House that, by my counting, there are 10 significant animal welfare measures which we have brought in, or which are very nearly through the process, so we are making progress in this area.