§ Mr. Hugh Bayley (York)On the day when I hope that the House will put the interests of wild mammals in front of those of their tormentors, I rise on behalf of 23,000 people to remind the House of an horrific act of cruelty to a wild mammal in Yorkshire. The petition reads as follows:
To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled.The humble petition of Mrs. Pat Murgatroyd of the Hedgehog haven, 43 Foxwood lane, Acomb, Yorkshire sheweth that on 14 July 1992 a petition was presented to Parliament containing nearly 23,000 signatures drawing attention to four 15 and 16-year-old boys accused of causing unnecessary suffering to a hedgehog by dropping rocks on it, kicking and beating it with a fence post and thereby breaking almost every bone in its body, who walked free from a juvenile court in Pocklington, Humberside in April 1992 because the Protection of Animals Act 1911 covers only cruelty to captive creatures, and it was judged that this hedgehog had not been captive.Wherefore your petitioner prays that your Honourable House brings about an Act of Parliament which will give hedgehogs and other wild animals legal protection against deliberate acts of cruelty.And your petitioner, as in duty bound, will ever pray, etc.That is signed by my constituent, Mrs. Pat Murgatroyd.
§ To lie upon the Table.