I share the high regard my constituents have for animal welfare, and I am glad that my colleagues in Government have set out a series of ambition reforms as outlined in the Action Plan for Animal Welfare. I am encouraged that since 2010, the Department has achieved many changes regarding improving animal welfare including banning the use of conventional battery cages for laying hens, as well as making CCTV mandatory in slaughterhouses across England. Other measures introduced include the mandatory microchipping of dogs in 2015 and the modernisation of the licensing system for dog breeding and pet sales.
I welcome that the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill will bring in some of the world’s strongest protections for pets, livestock and kept wild animals. This includes introducing a ban on keeping primates as pets, banning the export of live animals for slaughter and fattening, and also addressing the unethical trade of puppy smuggling by reducing the number of pets that can travel under pet travel rules. I welcome that the Bill has passed the Committee stage in the House of Commons and I look forward to supporting this Bill as it continues to progress through Parliament.
Lots of organisations including animal charities now choose to do their lobbying by identical mass email and the amount of emails of this nature has increased significantly in recent years. I hope you can appreciate that I am not always able to respond to all mass campaign based emails individually.
On these pages you can read my responses to some of the most popular recent email campaigns on the topic of animal welfare.
Of course, if you have any personal comments or specific concerns that you would like to raise with me then please do not hesitate to get in touch and I will endeavour to respond to these queries as soon as possible.
