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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many inspections of game bird farms were undertaken by (a) the Animal and Plant Health Agency and (b) local trading standards in 2018; and how many of those visits resulted in an animal welfare prosecution.

a) The Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) does not undertake routine inspections of game bird establishments, however inspections will be carried out if specific welfare issues are reported.

During the year 2018 APHA completed 23 welfare inspections on game bird farms in England, Scotland and Wales.

The breakdown is as follows:

England 8

Scotland 13

Wales 2

Total 23

b) APHA is unable to provide a response on behalf of local authorities. Local authority trading standards services do not have a statutory duty to undertake inspections of game bird facilities, although they may undertake some based on their internal risk analysis and local decision making. In order to ascertain the number of inspections carried out, it would be necessary to approach each individual local authority in England and request this information.

Prosecutions made under the Animal Health Act 1981 and incidences of disease are published in Section 80 of the Act. These also include all prosecutions made by local authorities under farmed animal welfare legislation. The report for 2018 can be found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/section-80-report-for-2018-under-the-animal-health-act-1981

Brief details of successful prosecutions are contained in Annex 1, but they do not detail any prosecutions against game bird farms specifically.