Welfare of Animals at the Time of Killing (England) Regulations 2015 — House of Lords, 2015-12-15
Topic: Agriculture
Kathryn Jane Parminter (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, for bringing forward this Motion to Regret. Most people would agree that these regulations improve the previous slaughter provisions but would share the strong concerns the noble Lord indicated about the potential impacts on the welfare of poultry of not including the stunning parameters when using electrical water-bath stunners for religious slaughter The aim must as far as possible be to deliver humane stunning of poultry, subject to the constraints, some of which the noble Lord outlined, of using electrical water-bath stunners, in a manner acceptable to the relevant religious authorities reliably and consistently to provide a recoverable stun. Using electrical water-bath stunners without stun parameters risks some birds being immobilised rather than stunned and being conscious when they move to the neck-cutting stage required by halal slaughter As the noble Lord made quite clear, stun parameters in these circumstances have been set in Wales and Northern Ireland, following work by the European Food Safety Authority. Indeed, that raises questions about how operators who have businesses in various parts of our nation will have a comparable standard. When these proposals were hastily withdrawn, some specific wording was outlined in the Explanatory Memorandum: "After making the 2014 WATOK Regulations, the Government decided that the potential impact on some limited aspects of religious slaughter needed further consideration and that it was preferable to revoke the 2014 WATOK Regulations in order to give full consideration to the relevant issues" I have read the Explanatory Memorandum and the various impact assessments that the department has provided, but at no stage does the EM or the IA spell out clearly what those issues were or what was the process of consideration by the Government. I think this House would demand that Defra operates evidence-based decision-making. I have found nowhere in the EM or the IA any indication of what specifically were the relevant issues or what was the process of their consideration that led to the removal of those regulations. What evidence are the Government using for removing these stun parameters? It is difficult to see that we can effectively stun all poultry without having set parameters The second issue I shall raise is the need for lessons to be learnt from the Government’s handling of this process. In its 11th report, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee highlighted the, "inadequacies in Defra’s handling of consultation", and, using what I believe is rather strong language, called the process of policy formulation, "protracted, uncertain and still unresolved" It chided the Government for having regulations still not in force three years later than the date set for implementation If the Minister is not going to agree to the recommendation made by the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, to re-lay the regulations including stunning parameters, will he say something about the internal review of the application of the regulations which is referred to in the Explanatory Memorandum? It makes clear that the Government intend to review this process within five years, but that it will be an internal review. I suggest that, given the concerns raised in this House and by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, any further review of these regulations should not be internal but should be public so that there can be full scrutiny of the impact of these regulations.