Horses: Transportation

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Caithness]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Higgins on finding time for this debate. Although it is focused on horses, your Lordships will know that the EU regulations on horses also cover other vertebrates, and I am sure that the House would not want to give the impression that it is not concerned about other vertebrates.

I have the honour to serve on Sub-Committee D, and we have been keeping an eagle eye on the transportation of livestock which are subject to EU regulations. The picture, as has been described, is pretty depressing. There was no doubt that the Danish presidency tried hard, with its five working parties, to get some agreement in the EU, but the EU is hopelessly riven. It is clear that it is completely split between those who want some reform, those who want no reform, and it is equally split among those who want some reform. As your Lordships will know, trying to get anything done in the EU when there is not cohesive agreement is almost impossible.

Therefore, I have huge sympathy for my noble friend on the Front Bench, because although we know what is right, if we do not have the support of the majority of the other member states—as we clearly do not—we can never achieve the high welfare standards necessary. Here, I have to be a little practical. Is the ambition of the highest possible standards to be the enemy of the good? Should not be UK be taking, not the highest position, which is what we might like to get to, but, to get a majority in the EU for change, ought we to drop the level of what we are trying to achieve? I know that the Government have been very keen to focus on the young stock that have been travelling. That is hugely important, and the committee supported the Government on that but, overall, if we are to make progress—with a future presidency, we might—perhaps we ought not to try to achieve the ultimate but to work to get a majority.

The EU regulations refer to,

“vertebrate animals transported in connection with an economic activity”.

Does my noble friend have any information on what animals are transported in what is not an economic activity? That might be useful to know. The EU prepared a paper in November. In one paragraph, which is a comparison of the quality of animal welfare during transport before and after the application of the regulation, it claims that,

“animal transport on long journeys has improved”,

but qualifies that by saying that,

“no firm conclusions can be established”.

How can the EU Commission possibly say that if there is no firm evidence? It is very good to give yourself a pat on the back, but that if there is no evidence to do so, you had better be a bit careful.

Turning to the use of navigation systems, again, there has been poor implementation. The use of navigation systems raises a question that runs through the Commission paper: the interpretation of existing regulations varies from member state to member state. Why is there a lack of clarity in the EU regulations? Surely that is a fundamental starting place so that one can get a wording that every country is bound by—they may not agree it, but they are bound by it—because only then can the Commission start to exercise what authority it has.

As has been said, the level of compliance and enforcement is up to each member state, but if there is a variation of interpretation of the regulations and some member states are therefore not complying and enforcing in the way that we do, any statistics are meaningless. You would not be comparing similar things. The basic need is for clarity in the regulations and then we must then ask the EU to make certain that compliance and enforcement are the same throughout every member state.

When it comes to penalties and sanctions, the Commission also says that it is very difficult to get a comparison between the countries, because of the various legal systems and because of the available data. It goes on to say that it considers this to be an unsatisfactory situation,

“and encouraged Member States to provide for more harmonised application of the rules … ‘taking into account the limits of the competence that Member States and the legislators have decided to give to the Commission’”.

I am certainly not one who wishes to give more powers to the Commission—I think it has too many already, as your Lordships will have heard me say on many occasions—but perhaps this is one area where I might back off a little. Can my noble friend tell me whether the Commission is right in putting the blame back on to the member states or does he think that the Commission is not fulfilling the tasks that have already been allotted to it?

This is a very sad subject to have to debate yet again. We should not be doing it but it is clear that there is such diversity of opinion throughout the member states. This Government have done so much, as indeed did the previous Government who also got support from Sub-Committee D. Perhaps my noble friend on the Front Bench can give us some idea of how the Government see this being tackled in the future.