Standing Committee F
Tuesday 11 February 2003
(Afternoon)
[Part II]
[Mrs. Marion Roe in the Chair]
[Continuation from column 982]
5.30 pm
Mr. Luff: I was a little disturbed to hear the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West, whose contributions to the Committee have been characterised by honesty and intellectual rigour, seeking to resort to the numbers game in the argument about whether clause 6 should stand part of the Bill.
Most vets do not want hunting banned; it is not easy to argue against that point. I remind the hon. Gentleman that the whole debate on deer hunting—and other forms of hunting—has been driven by two organisations, the RSPCA and the League Against Cruel Sports, which represent 0.1 per cent. and 0.2 per cent. of the British population respectively. Bearing in mind that opinion polls suggest that British people want hunting regulated, not banned, I would advise Labour Members to play the numbers game with great care.
I was impressed by the honest nature of aspects of what the hon. Gentleman—and other Labour Members—said during the debate. The hon. Members for Sherwood and for Weaver Vale made clear their honest and sincerely held view that clause 6 does not go far enough, and that they intend to ensure that it goes further when the Bill reaches the Floor of the House. The Middle Way Group would like to engage with that issue and—although it wants to reach a different conclusion—agrees with them about it.
The hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West made it clear during his interesting speech that he was driven by a simple disapproval of what human beings did, rather than the animal welfare implications of the measure. The Middle Way Group is a little uncertain of the animal welfare implications of banning deer hunting. We think that the evidence is not clear-cut, and we are not entirely sure which conclusion we should reach on the least suffering test.
Simply disapproving of something should not be grounds for banning it. Just because one does not like what other people do does not mean that one should ban it. That applies to deer hunting, adultery or owning a caravan. I choose the last subject with some care, knowing the Minister's boss, but caravans are something of which I heartily disapprove. They get in the way on roads, they are rather dangerous, they turn over on motorways and they are a hazard to life and limb, but I would not actually ban them. The case for banning them, however, is a good deal stronger than that for the banning of deer hunting.
Adultery does a lot of harm, and I disapprove of it heartily. I have a moral perspective on the issue, and I
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think that it is utterly unacceptable, but we are not going to ban adultery. In this place, we have to allow people to do things that we disapprove of because that is the nature of democracy. If there is no animal welfare argument for banning deer hunting—I am not sure about that, but I do not think that the evidence is there—we cannot use disapproval.
We cannot say what the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West has just said. I cannot remember his exact words, but he said something like, ''In this day and age I do not think that human beings should do this.'' That is not grounds for a ban. In the Middle Way Group, we believe in balancing freedom against animal welfare. If the animal welfare arguments are strong, something should be banned, and I accept that entirely. Where they are equivocal, one must give more weight to the human liberty argument.
We had a small debate on what happens in the New Forest. I know the New Forest very well, and I know that culling techniques there are very different from those on Exmoor. Majority culling takes place from permanently installed towers, in which marksmen are at an elevation above the deer. The deer gather in well-known areas and are shot from above; it is a safe and easy technique. The situation in Exmoor is very different. It is a much larger area, in which the deer's whereabouts are less easy to predict. One certainly could not use high towers. I may be wrong about that, so I shall happily give way.
Mr. Hall: I am not disputing the hon. Gentleman's point. Does that shooting take place during the day or at night?
Mr. Luff: I do not know when it takes place. Stag hunting in the New Forest was not banned. It was indicated that the buck hounds would not have their licence renewed and they gave up. They withdrew, in effect, voluntarily, but knowing that they would probably not get their licence. Since then, significantly more deer have had to be culled by marksmen in the way that I have described. I do not know whether that is during the day or at night. I shall find out.
Mr. Flook: Is my hon. Friend aware that the New Forest commoners are already beginning to complain vociferously and regularly because the deer are not being moved on and are over-grazing certain areas?
Mr. Luff: Yes; and that brings us to utility and pest control. I am not sure that the Minister is right to say that deer hunting could not pass the utility test or the least suffering test. There is a strong argument that deer hunting in the New Forest had a considerable utilitarian benefit. The hunt used to disperse the deer through the forest into areas where the general public were frequent visitors. Since the ending of deer hunting, I am told that the deer now congregate in large numbers in more private areas of the forest, which are more biologically sensitive and commercially important, away from the general public. That means that the Forestry Commission has to cull significantly more deer than were culled in total by the old, combined management regime.
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I do not know for certain, but the New Forest experience suggests that the Minister is wrong to reach the cast-iron conclusion that deer hunting fails the utility and least suffering tests, so must automatically be banned. The awful thought at the back of my mind is that clause 6 is in the Bill in an attempt to appease some of the political opinion on his Back Benches. Manifestly, as the debate has shown, it has not succeeded.
Mr. Gray: I should like to correct one point of detail in my hon. Friend's excellent speech. It appears from Hansard that the Minister and his noble Friend Lord Whitty have accepted that deer hunting passes the utility test. If it is to be banned, presumably it must be on the grounds of cruelty.
Mr. Luff: I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for reminding me of that information. We should pause and ask whether clause 6 should stand part of the Bill. Is the case as clear-cut as the Minister has claimed? Several people in the scientific world are rethinking the positions that they have taken on the scientific evidence, and it is tremendously important for the Minister to take account of that. We are talking about only three packs. It is not as if the registrar would be overwhelmed with work. We have discussed exempting other forms of hunting where not doing so will lead to thousands of applications to the registrar and risk overwhelming him with work. The Minister has happily allowed that, but there are only three packs involved in deer hunting. Once the first has gone through the system, the precedent probably will be established.
The Middle Way Group position, simply, is that there is no reason to single out deer for a ban. We do not believe that the tests are drawn correctly; the utility test, in particular, has not yet been drawn correctly by the Government and the Committee, according to the original proposals. However, if the tests are drawn correctly, they should be applied equally to all forms of hunting with dogs. We cannot see an argument, other than a political one, for special treatment for deer.
If the Minister is determined on his course of action—and if the House, in the Committee and on Report, endorses that course—there are certain things that he must do to ensure the proper management of the deer herd and the countryside where the deer are. There are problems in the New Forest, which he could go and see for himself, and there will be problems elsewhere, including on Exmoor. A deer commission for England and Wales has been discussed in the Committee, and he should look at that. Other measures might include legally recognising deer management groups and tagging deer after they have been shot to ensure that they are properly treated and taken to a game dealer in an appropriate way.
There are a host of practical considerations for the Minister. I shall not labour the point now, but I hope that, in his concluding remarks, he will give the Committee a sense of what he will do about the problems that inevitably will be created if he is determined to press ahead with the ban. That would
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be intellectually consistent with the rigorous position that he has claimed to adopt.
Judy Mallaber (Amber Valley): I will be extremely brief, as I think that the arguments have been well aired. I rise merely to express my wholehearted support for the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood. I support the content of clause 6 and shall vote in favour of it. I look forward to the response of my right hon. Friend the Minister on the arguments that have been made. I am sorry only that my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, North (Dr. Gibson) is not here because I understand that, as a doctor of biology—which we have said that we are missing—and former university academic, he made a scholarly scientific presentation on Professor Bateson's research in a previous Committee. Such a presentation would have supported our contentions on clause 6 and the stress caused to deer.
I have listened to the arguments of the hon. Member for Taunton with some bemusement, and have tried to make some sense of his statistics. I have to say that I still do not understand, from his figures, his explanation of why overall deer numbers would fall. I could not make the numbers add up when I tried to extrapolate from his figures from the Burns report. Perhaps he can come back to that on another occasion.
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