Fur: Import and Sale

Robbie Moore Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2026 Westminster Hall

[Robbie Moore (Keighley and Ilkley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine. I thank the hon. Member for Newport West and Islwyn (Ruth Jones) for securing today’s debate. She has been a tireless campaigner on this issue in her role as a shadow Minister before the general election, in tabling a private Member’s Bill and securing many Westminster Hall debates on animal welfare issues. I congratulate her on securing this important debate.

As all Members indicated in their contributions, fur farming has rightly been banned in England and Wales since 2000. Legislation prohibits the keeping and breeding of animals solely or primarily for slaughter due to the value of their fur, but that was 26 years ago. The hon. Lady raised the issue of fairness in how, while we have a ban in place here, we still enable imports that do not meet our standards. We have not yet achieved a ban on imports. Personally, I feel that is wholly unfair and inadequate, and it needs to be explored.

What position do we see ourselves in today? There are several restrictions in place that seek to monitor and control how this trade can be carried out in the UK. There are restrictions on some skin and fur products that may never be legally imported into the UK, including fur from cats and dogs, but we all acknowledge that it still does not go far enough. There are also established controls on fur from endangered species protected by the convention on international trade in endangered species, and on imports of fur from wild animals caught using methods that are non-compliant with international humane trapping standards, but again that does not go far enough.

Under the Textile Products (Labelling and Fibre Composition) Regulations 2012—EU regulations that have now been assimilated into UK law—any textile product that contains real fur or other animal-derived materials must carry the mandatory label:

“Contains non-textile parts of animal origin”.

That wording must appear exactly as specified and must be clearly visible to consumers. The regulations require all textile products to display a label identifying their fibre content, including any fur, leather or bone. I would argue that is not adequate or clear enough to a consumer who is buying a product, and therefore it does not go far enough.

Many Members have rightly said that while we have banned fur farming and created a direction for other countries to follow, continuing to enable imports is still offshoring our responsibility. I therefore urge the Government to explore that route.

We know that fur imports are decreasing. Under the previous Administration, as we all know, animal welfare standards increased and the volume of fur imported fell by 50% in five years. The trend is declining and there is a decrease in consumers buying imported fur, so the economics back the position of taking a much stronger approach to banning imported fur.

A consultation was launched seeking views on the fur market. The call for evidence received over 30,000 responses from businesses, representative bodies and individuals, demonstrating strong public support and interest. It is good to see that the Government have now published the responses to that consultation, but I would like to understand from the Minister how the Government will go forward.

In addition to the interests of businesses, it is clear that this is an issue that matters to the British public. A petition to ban fur imports was launched by the Fur Free Britain campaign, receiving over 1.5 million signatures. The issue has also been debated many times in this place. We all acknowledge that this demonstrates a strong feeling from the British people that the import of fur should be banned. I would like to clearly understand the Government’s position following the Animal Welfare Committee’s report, which was published following that petition.

The Government announced their animal welfare strategy in December. Much of it was welcome, but I want to ask the Minister why it did not include a ban on fur imports, as it had previously been indicated that an incoming Labour Government would be willing to explore that. I also want to seek clarity from the Government on the potential timeframe for any additional consultation that is likely to be announced on this issue. What will they be doing, in addition to what is announced in the animal welfare strategy, to explore the issue further?

As has been said, much good work has been done by previous Administrations, and there is an indication of more of this in the animal welfare strategy, to improve animal welfare generally in this country. That was picked up by one of the contributions about ear cropping. We cannot be in a scenario where we are banning things from happening here but effectively enabling an equivalent product—whether it is food, a live animal or a product from a live animal—that is banned or that does not meet our expected level of animal welfare to come into the country. That is simply unfair, and I want to push the Minister on what the Government’s position is on the timing of that going forward.