Lead Shot Ammunition

Debate between Charles Walker and Simon Hart

Tuesday 8th December 2015 Westminster Hall

[Simon Hart]

I am grateful for that intervention. I have not yet said, and I am not sure that I will say, that there is no toxicity issue at all. Perhaps if the hon. Gentleman will hear me and other colleagues out, he may get the answer he requires.

The Lead Ammunition Group was set up to come to a unanimous view on steps forward for the Secretary of State. However, it has failed to do that. Nearly half of its members resigned, which meant that its final report was submitted without input from those valuable sources. The report, which was based on evidence that was and remains disputed, reached conclusions outside the terms of reference set by the Secretary of State in the first place. Therefore, when coming to conclusions about what all of this means, I hope that the Minister will recognise that, for whatever reason, the Lead Ammunition Group has failed in its objectives.

Food concerns were mentioned by the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham). The advice given so far does not need any alteration. That is key, because if we look at it in the context of other food scares and consumption habits, there is no evidence to suggest that the danger posed by lead is any greater than that of any other food substance that we might arguably eat to excess. That is the point: we can point to any number of foodstuffs and say, “If you ate this foodstuff to excess, you might come across a health problem.” The advice given is quite contextualised, which has not been the case in the debate.

The contribution I want to make to the debate is to give a word of caution about the Lead Ammunition Group’s findings. They are not definitive; they are disputed and the evidence it relied on is hotly debated. Finally, if the problem was as great as one or two Members suggest, it would have emerged as a health scare long before now. We therefore need to treat what we are hearing with caution, assuming that it is evidence. It is nothing new.

[Mr Charles Walker]

I am listening closely to my hon. Friend. Will he address my concern that steel shot ricochets, which will cause the closure of many shooting grounds, and that tungsten, bismuth and Hevi-shot cost five to seven times as much as lead? That would be a significant part of most people’s shooting budget.

[Simon Hart]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. We have to consider all these things in the round. It is no doubt very easy to find reasons to argue in favour of a general phase-out of lead, but unless we have applied the same rigorous test to the alternatives—whether it is about the cost, humaneness or toxicity—there is no reason to believe we will go from a bad place to a better one, so I take his points entirely on board.

I hope the Minister will be robust in making a careful examination of this so-called report, because it does not meet the terms of reference that his own Department set.