§ Mr. MonroI beg to move amendment No. 112, in page 8, line 32, leave out from 'owner' to end of line 41 and insert
'of a zoo to which this Act applies, this Act shall apply with the following additions and modifications.We discussed in Committee how we could ensure that the local authority would not be jury and judge in its own case, and I gave an undertaking to put down an amendment to that effect. Amendment No. 112 provides in effect that the Secretary of State must be sent a copy of all inspection reports and licences issued, complete with any comment that the local authority may have.
- (2) As soon as practicable after granting a licence for the zoo, or extending the period of a licence, or receiving an inspectors' report made in pursuance of an inspection of the zoo under this Act, the authority shall send to the Secretary of State a copy of the licence, or notification in writing of the extension, or a copy of the report (as the case may be).
- (3) The authority shall send with the copy of the report any comments on it which they may have.
- (4) The Secretary of State (instead of the authority) shall have power, after giving the holder of the licence an opportunity to be heard, to revoke the licence on any of the grounds mentioned in section 17(1)(a) to (d), and references in those paragraphs to the authority shall be construed as references to the Secretary of State.
- (5) Subsection (1A) and (2) of section 17 apply for the purposes of subsection (4) above as if references to the authority were references to the Secretary of State, and section 18 applies for those purposes with the appropriate modifications.'.
Secondly, the Secretary of State will have power to revoke licences under clause 17(1). In practice, I am sure that this will give him all the powers that he needs, without pressing upon him a licensing function that he is not equipped to carry out. As there are only three local authority zoos, it is not estimated that this will be a very onerous task.
§ Amendment agreed to.