Animal Cruelty: Sentencing

Stuart C McDonald Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Redcar (Anna Turley) on bringing the debate before the House. I recognise her strong interest in the matter: I understand that she queued for many hours to table her Animal Cruelty (Sentencing) Bill. I thank all hon. Members for their powerful contributions so far.

This subject should be revisited on a regular basis, not least, as hon. Members have said, because of the strong public interest it attracts. We have heard described today some absolutely abhorrent crimes. As the hon. Member for Redcar explained, the principal legislation in England and Wales is the Animal Welfare Act 2006. The equivalent legislation in Scotland is the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006, which contains similar offences and provides for sentences of up to 12 months’ imprisonment or a £20,000 fine.

I essentially want to say two things. First, I remain sympathetic to the case for stronger sentences. It is a strong case, particularly for the worst of the incidents we have heard about, and I certainly do not see any reason why the provision for 12-month sentences has not yet been implemented in England and Wales. Secondly, it is important to remember that sentencing is only one small part of the action required to reduce the number of animal cruelty crimes across the UK.

I shall take those points in turn. As regards maximum sentencing, we have heard a lot of horrendous detail about some crimes that have committed in recent months, but we also need to keep in mind, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) said, that many of the animal cruelty cases that make it to the courts and into the newspapers seem to arise out of lack of awareness, transient personal problems, ignorance and even mental health issues. Without in any way playing down the suffering caused to the animals involved, it is important to keep that type of case in mind when considering sentencing options.

I would be slow to say that an increased maximum penalty across the board is the correct way forward, but one alternative worth considering is to separate out offences of deliberate cruelty from those that are, in essence, acts of negligence. The legislation in England and Wales, and in Scotland, seems to incorporate both kinds of act into the same offence, with the same maximum sentence. If deliberate infliction of suffering was made a separate offence, I do not see how anyone could oppose an increased maximum sentence, so that those engaged in torturing animals or in organised fighting, for example, could face a more severe punishment that reflected the public’s disapproval. They could receive a sentence that matched the crime. So in short, some increase in sentencing powers is a good idea.

My second point is that we should not see maximum sentencing as any sort of silver bullet, because there are other things we need to look at. For a start, there is not much point in increasing maximum sentences if courts are not using the full range of their current powers. That is why it is certainly welcome that the Sentencing Council for England and Wales has proposed new guidelines with the intention of ensuring that the most serious cases attract custodial sentences of an appropriate length. Equally, I welcomed the evidence given recently by the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee here at Westminster. The witness said:

“The Scottish court system in the last four or five years has improved for intentional acts against animals. We are getting far more bans now. We are finally seeing some people being jailed”.

But moving away from sentencing altogether, the same witness said that

“for a lot of the people we deal with, it is neglect and ignorance, so that is why we keep banging the education drum. We have the biggest outreach programme for children in Scotland: 340,000 children spoken to last year. They are the owners next year and in the next 10 years, so we can prevent some of them coming into it”.

So let us also keep in mind the role that education can play in preventing acts of animal cruelty. The SSPCA programme involves education officers, animal rescue officers and inspectors speaking to primary school children between the ages of eight and 11. Recent research by the University of Edinburgh has highlighted the hugely beneficial impact that such programmes can have, including increasing knowledge, creating positive attitudes and decreasing children’s tolerance of animal cruelty. Since the scheme was first implemented in 2010, the SSPCA has seen a 382% increase in the number of calls from children alerting the charity to cases of animals in need of help or cases of neglect.

That reminds us also of the importance of increasing public awareness, which my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran mentioned, and ensuring that everyone knows what to do if they suspect an offence and that those who no longer feel up to the task of looking after an animal know where to seek appropriate assistance. I also agree that buying a pet on Gumtree is utterly unacceptable.

There is a case for tougher sentences in the worst cases, but I would be reluctant to look at the whole range of offences on the same terms. We must always remember the other things we need to get on with, so that rather than dealing with offences after they have occurred we do what we can to prevent them from happening in the first place.