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Mr. Gummer: Did my hon. Friend notice that the Minister also said that one should not apply the exemption to rabbits because it would cause a great deal of bureaucracy and paperwork. Yet, evidently we are to apply it to stoats and weasels. I hope that my hon. Friend will press the point home. The Minister has said that a gamekeeper who wants to use more than two dogs on stoats and weasels will have to ask for a licence. That is so preposterous and so ludicrous that he undermines any sense that the Bill may contain. Mr. Gray: My right hon. Friend makes a good point. We have argued all along that an enormous amount of bureaucracy and delay will be involved if too many applications go to the registrar. We were arguing that on Tuesday with regard to dogs at field trials, which will apparently now have to be registered. Every time a gamekeeper uses his dogs for any purpose, he will have to make two or three separate applications for the different quarry species that he wants to catch. The registrar will be buried under applications and bureaucracy. Now, the Minister is admitting that and justifying the exemption of rats and rabbits for that reason. He has also said that if he did not exempt them, an unduly harsh burden would be placed on gamekeepers and farmers. That is precisely what we have been arguing for foxes, mink, stoats and weasels. If the Minister passes these measures he will place an unreasonable burden not only on the registrar and tribunal system, but on gamekeepers and farmers.
2.45 pmNone of the arguments that the Minister has advanced has taken us one inch closer to understanding why he has singled out rats and rabbits. We can conclude only that he has done so for political reasons, because of human behaviour and because of the people who he believes take part in ratting and rabbiting compared to those who take part in foxhunting or deer hunting. In the brief remarks that he has just made, he gave us no clue on what special evidence had led to that conclusion. He sat in Column Number: 867 his eyrie round the corner in DEFRA and concluded, for his own good reasons, that rats and rabbits should be exempt. He refuses, time after time, to tell us, the public or anybody why he came to that conclusion. When I asked a moment ago, he said that there was evidence, which was easily available. When I asked what that was, he said that I had not been listening, so he would not tell me.There is no evidence. If there is, I again challenge the Minister to produce it. If there is any shred of evidence that explains for why rats and rabbits should be singled out, whether written or scientific or whatever, I challenge him to tell us what it is. If he cannot do that, I put it to him that the reason for this decision is nothing to do with evidence, but purely the human behaviour that he believes lies behind ratting and rabbiting and behind deer hunting. We shall come in a moment to what the Minister has called the incontrovertible evidence that has caused him to mess up the part of the Bill on deer hunting. I shall challenge him to lay out in very precise, detailed terms what that evidence is. He says that he has evidence for wrecking part of the Bill to exempt these two categories, and we want to know what it is. The Minister has made a concession to ratting and rabbiting. We do not want to mess that up. That would be quite wrong, because there are farmers who will welcome it. Incidentally, as a Minister of the Crown, perhaps he will address himself to the issues rather than making cheap jibes. We tabled this probing amendment to try to investigate the Bill's bizarre structure, but we are obviously not going to press it to a vote because we like the fact that the exemption has been made. That seems sensible and legitimate. [Interruption.] The Minister says, from a sedentary position, that we are being inconsistent, but we are not. We welcome the exemptions and will welcome any other exemptions that he cares to make. We tried this morning to persuade him to make an exemption for mink hunting, which he refused to do. We notice the fundamental illogicality in the Bill but, plainly, we are not going to seek to correct it. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment. Hon. Members: No. Amendment negatived. Mr. Edward Garnier (Harborough): On a point of order, Mr. Stevenson. Before we come to the next group of amendments, can inquiries be made about facilities in Portcullis house for this Committee? This Room is the black hole of Calcutta. It is very hot, so either the heating should be turned off or the windows opened. As you mentioned at the outset of the sitting, this Room is too small. I know that you have set inquiries in train to see whether we can go anywhere else on this Corridor and that nowhere is available, but can exploration be made of Portcullis house? It is a very grand and expensive building, which should be properly used. Ms Candy Atherton (Falmouth and Camborne): Further to that point of order, Mr. Stevenson. Earlier, you said that you had asked for the central heating to be turned off. As I am sitting next to it, I can inform you that it is still powering out. Column Number: 868 The Chairman: That is interesting, because I was advised that it had been turned off. I am sure that the Clerk will ensure that it is turned off. That would be extremely helpful. The point made by the hon. and learned Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier) about Portcullis house is being heard as we speak. We will move every muscle to try to get better accommodation. Gregory Barker (Bexhill and Battle): I beg to move amendment No. 54, in
The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment No. 344, in
Amendment No. 55, in
Amendment No. 345, in
Amendment No. 56, in
Amendment No. 346, in
Gregory Barker: As was demonstrated at length this morning, there is an extraordinary lack of intellectual integrity shaping and informing the Bill. Although the Minister tells us that the principles of utility and cruelty are the acid test in the Bill, we know that whenever the issues of utility and cruelty are invoked, they logically lead to a conclusion that argues in favour of more permissive and liberal legislation. However, the Minister and his supporters recoil from that conclusion. Both sides of the Committee should be concerned with an issue that goes beyond cruelty and utility: namely, animal welfare. I hope that the welfare of animals is the common thread that unites us all—[Interruption.] I resist my colleagues' attempts to make me use the Minister's golden thread, because I am afraid that that rhetorical device has become somewhat tarnished. Animal welfare is what I am most concerned about. I first came to the House as a teenager to lobby for an animal welfare cause, long before I joined a political party, so I will not take lectures from Labour Members or listen to claims that I am not interested in animal welfare. I believe that every person who has a genuine interest in the countryside and country sports has a real and enduring interest in the welfare of all animals. What we fear and what underlies the amendments are the extraordinary unintended consequences of the Bill. Those consequences will have an extremely negative effect on animal welfare, particularly on the welfare of the fox. It is extraordinary that, if the Bill is not amended, many foxes will suffer in a really grisly way. They will suffer as they would not have suffered before the Bill became law. Amendment No. 54 would ensure that dogs could be used to dispatch orphaned cubs, under the provisions for exempt hunting. If foxhunting were Column Number: 869 banned, there would be a dramatic increase in the number of nursing vixen being shot. That would be a fact of life. There is no closed season for shooting foxes, and shooting foxes will be the only real alternative to control the fox population. No thought has been given to the protection of the cubs of the vixen that will be shot.Mr. Hugo Swire (East Devon): Would my hon. Friend go so far as to say that unless the Government accept the amendment, which is driven by concern for animal welfare, their thinking will be exposed for what it is? It has nothing to do with animal welfare, and everything to do with the management of human behaviour. Gregory Barker: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. If Labour Members oppose the amendment, it will display for the whole world to see that they have a prejudice against a certain form of human activity. I want to make sure that the welfare of the fox is put in first place, and that the prejudices that are so readily displayed by those on the Government Benches are put firmly in second. The Protection of Wild Mammals (Scotland) Act 2002 makes special provision for dealing with orphaned cubs and allows them to be despatched using dogs below ground. Rob Marris (Wolverhampton, South-West): The hon. Gentleman cites the Act from Scotland. Could he cite the definition of ''orphaned''? I have sympathy with what he says, but I am concerned about the meaning of it. Her Majesty the Queen is an orphan now that her mother has died, but I do not think that he means an orphaned mammal in that sense. Gregory Barker: The definition of ''orphan'' is pretty obvious: it is a cub that has lost its nursing parent. A cub that is below ground is unable to feed itself. Any dependent offspring could become an orphan. Mr. Gummer: Her Majesty the Queen could not in any circumstances be referred to as a cub. A cub is not a fully grown animal. We are talking about cubs underground with nursing mothers.
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