Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to the oral contribution by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs of 9 January, Official Report column 139WH, what discussions she has had with the devolved administrations on the potential merits of banning the use of snares.

A date is being arranged for a meeting with Lesley Griffiths, MS for Rural Affairs in the Welsh Government after the Easter recess. I will be interested to discuss the Welsh Government’s plans to ban the use of snares in Wales. I also intend to engage with my counterpart in the Scottish Government, particularly with regard to the effectiveness of its existing legislation covering snares and the Scottish Animal Welfare Commission’s recent position paper on the trapping of terrestrial wild mammals using snares. In the meantime, my officials are in regular contact with colleagues in the devolved administrations as this government continues to consider how snares are regulated as part of our continued drive to maintain the highest animal welfare standards in the world.