Glue Traps (Offences) Bill

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 19th January 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)]

Thank you for the honour of serving in this debate, Mr Dowd. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Jane Stevenson) on her private Member’s Bill reaching Committee. I attended its Second Reading on 19 November last year and greatly enjoyed the contributions of many Members, and was glad to hear the Government support for the Bill.

In the United Kingdom, we are rightly proud of the welfare standards for animals. The Brexit dividend has enabled us to continue to advance our world-leading animal welfare standards. Future legislation will introduce strong legal protections for all animals and ban the use of inhumane glue traps.

Pest control is necessary as pests can be a huge threat to public health, but they should be captured and controlled as humanely as possible. Other traps, such as snap or break back, are more humane, cost effective and reusable. Glue traps inflict slow, painful deaths on animals that have been captured, and do not just target rodents because other wildlife can be caught by these indiscriminate traps. They are described by many as one of the cruellest forms of rodent control. Therefore, I support the ban on this mechanism. Ireland and New Zealand already have bans and have transitioned seamlessly.

In my eyes, people with professional pest control licences should be able to continue to purchase these traps, because they are qualified to use them. The pest control industry is evolving as people become more aware of animal sentience and the need to treat all animals humanely. I welcome this legislation, and I once again applaud my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East for introducing it.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mr Dowd. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East for raising this important issue and for the constructive way she has worked with Opposition colleagues. I commend her, because she has secured what the authors of so many private Members’ Bills really want—the elusive support of Her Majesty’s Government. I hope she will share any tips on how she has achieved that.

This has been a busy week for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and its Ministers, and it is good to see the Minister in her place. It feels like only yesterday we were both on the Front Benches in the Chamber—oh, yes, it was only yesterday! We still welcome the Bill, as we did on Second Reading last year. In that debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Olivia Blake) noted that banning glue traps was supported by a range of campaigners, stakeholders and organisations. That support still stands today, and extends across the Opposition Benches.

We have had an excellent debate about positive and constructive ways to move forward today. My hon. Friends the Members for Rotherham and for Bristol East and my right hon. Friend the Member for Alyn and Deeside have all made constructive, helpful comments about enforcement, the scope of the Bill and the language, including the issuing of licences and the definition of pest control. We must nail down those important issues to ensure that the Act is as strong and powerful as possible. Will the Minister indicate what further thinking has taken place in the Department since Second Reading? We have not tabled any amendments at this stage, but we reserve the right to do so on Report. Much will depend on the Minister’s response to the points raised today.

Issues about animal welfare, including the need for this Bill, have had a good hearing this week. We debated the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Bill yesterday and we await the next stage of the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill. Discussions are ongoing about that. That will help to put this Bill in context. These pieces of legislation demonstrate why we need to make this Bill fit for purpose, to ensure we are delivering the strongest possible animal welfare policy across the piece.

On enforcement, covered in clauses 4 to 6, we need to think about a joined-up approach with the devolved Administrations. We have all had discussions and thoughts about mice racing across the border between Wales and England, or the other way around, so I ask the Minister to address that point in her response. As a Welsh MP, I highlight that Members in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are no less passionate about care and welfare of animals. We want to be part of the solution. The Bill has our support.

I hope the Minister will reflect on colleagues’ contributions as the Bill progresses through the House. The hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East has done many animals a service by bringing the Bill to this House. I thank her for doing so. I look forward to working with colleagues in making the Bill as strong and purposeful as possible.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East for bringing forward this private Member’s Bill, which is, as she said, so important for animal welfare. I join her in thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory), who stood in for her when she had to take some time away from this place—although I know she was watching on. It has been an absolute pleasure to work with my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East on progressing the Bill. As we have heard today, the measures are sensible. Everybody wants to stop the use of glue traps.

I thank all hon. Members for their contributions, and I thank the organisations that supported the introduction of the Bill; the hon. Member for Rotherham referred to some of them. I reassure her and other Committee members that one of the reasons for a two-year delay was to get this right; we needed those further conversations about how to do this most effectively. My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East talked about new technology, such as pressure pads that inform someone electronically when an animal has been caught in a trap, so that it can be dispatched as soon as possible. They are still in use; there is also the point about making sure, through licences, that we know where such devices are. That will have to be done in steps.

As the hon. Member for Newport West said, there is a challenge in that we are slightly out of step with the devolved Administrations. My offer to her before the sitting was to discuss how we can talk to the devolved Ministers with responsibility. On Second Reading, the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow said that she felt that the Scottish Government would be interested in looking at the matter.