UK-India Free Trade Agreement

Mike Martin Excerpts

Monday 9th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffith]

I will try to leave the Minister with a short list of questions, rather than going through each and every one as we go.

Notwithstanding what the Minister has just said—perhaps we can revert to this later—there are also concerns about the Government’s hypocrisy in respect of pesticides and animal welfare, particularly with regard to crustaceans. I do not know whether the Minister has quite the same degree of expertise in crustacean welfare and in particular prawn eyestalk ablation, which sounds more trivial here than it would to the prawn whose eyestalks are being ablated. Those concerns are particularly relevant because despite the Government publishing and vaunting their virtue in terms of animal welfare, these poor blinded prawns seem to be victims under this deal. [Interruption.] I would be happy to give way to the Minister on prawn eyestalk ablation, which is an important point; perhaps, on winding up, he could make a more general point on trade deals and how the Government will protect our animal welfare and food safety standards.

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

Do prawns feel pain?

[Andrew Griffith]

I am in no way qualified to answer that. However, it is the Government’s position about crustacean welfare, and they should speak to it. Just before Christmas, they published a significant proposal to change the law on that. As ever in trade, this is not a point about the underlying fundamentals, on which the Minister will be advised by Government scientists and others—I did part of his job as Minister for Exports; it is a point about the symmetry and balance of the issue.