Animals: Exports

(asked on 24th October 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to help ensure the welfare of kept animals (a) imported into and (b) exported from the UK.


Answered by
Mark Spencer Portrait
Mark Spencer
Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This question was answered on 3rd November 2022

HM Government published a wide-reaching and ambitious Action Plan for Animal Welfare on 12 May 2021, setting out current and future work on animal welfare. Now that we have left the EU, we are making significant changes to domestic law through the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill, bringing into legislation manifesto commitments to end the export of live animals for fattening and slaughter and to crack down on puppy smuggling.

Through the Bill, HM Government will be banning exports of cattle, sheep, pigs, goats, and equines for slaughter and fattening on journeys that begin in or transit through the United Kingdom to a third country. The Bill also protects the welfare of pet animals, addressing low welfare movements of pets into Great Britain, including powers to introduce new restrictions, via secondary legislation, on pet travel and the commercial import of pets on welfare grounds.

HM Government is committed to improving the welfare standards of all animal journeys. We have consulted on proposals for improvements to animal welfare in transport and we published the summary of responses and HM Government’s response to this consultation in August 2021. We are now working closely with all interested partners on the detailed issues and evidence, to create workable solutions and good welfare outcomes.

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