HL Deb 21 May 1925 vol 61 cc473-8

Amendments reported (according to Order).

Clause 4:

Offences and legal proceedings.

4.—(1) If any person— (a) not being registered under this Act exhibits or trains any performing animal; or he shall be guilty of an offence against Act and shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds.

LORD RAGLAN moved, at the end of subsection (1), to insert the following proviso:— Provided that proceedings shall not be taken against any person under paragraph (a) of this subsection unless such person has failed to comply with the provisions of this Act within fourteen day of receiving notice to do so.

The noble Lord said: My Lords, the object of this Amendment is to deal with the case of a trainer who arrives in this country, say, from New York, and either through ignorance of the law or lack of opportunity may fail or be unable to register himself before his arrival in this country. As the Bill now stands, I am afraid he would have to spend some time without either training or exhibiting his animals, and in certain cases that might be a great hardship. This Amendment would also operate to protect a person who might inadvertently break the law. It is possible that the most rev. Primate might find himself in the police court unless the Amendment is accepted. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 4, line 7, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Raglan.)

LORD DANESFORT

My Lords, I am afraid I cannot accept this Amendment and I hope that your Lordships will not accept it. In the first place, it introduces an extremely novel principle into our legislation—namely, that every one of the forty-two millions of people in this country is entitled to receive notice of the provisions of the Bill once it is passed; because the Amendment says that proceedings shall not be taken against any one unless he has received notice. On that ground alone, although I congratulate my noble friend on his courage, I think your Lordships are not likely to accept the Amendment. In regard to the case of the gentleman who comes over from America, it is quite easy for him, when bringing his animals over here, to take steps also to register himself, and if he registers himself he will not, of course, suffer under the Bill.

LORD DESBOROUGH

My Lords, the Home Office takes the view which has just been expressed by my noble friend Lord Danesfort. If anybody comes over here for fourteen days there is no reason why he should bully his animals for fourteen days, but he might just as well register. He probably has an advance agent and there is no reason why he should be treated differently to anybody else. The fact is, I think, that in this country we are kinder to animals than is the case elsewhere.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 5:

Interpretation, rules, and expenses.

5.—(1) For the purposes of this Act— The expression "animal" includes bird, reptile and fish:

LORD DESBOROUGH moved to make the definition of "animal" read as follows: "The expression 'animal' does not include invertebrates. "The noble Lord said: My Lords, the House will remember that on the last occasion there was some discussion on the word "animal" which in the Bill was described as including birds, reptiles, and fish, which followed the precedent set in another Bill, and I wish now to omit the words "includes bird, reptile and fish," and put in their place "does not include invertebrates." Since our last discussion I thought it my duty to look up in the Encyclopædia what an animal really is, and I find it says this:— An animal may be defined as a living organism, the protoplasm of which does not secrete a cellulose cell-wall, and which requires for its existence proteid material obtained from the living or dead bodies of existing plants or animals. Then it goes on to say—and this may be somewhat surprising to some of the noble Lords who took part in the last debate on this Bill—that "the common use of the word animal as the equivalent of mammal, as opposed to bird or reptile or fish, is erroneous." The Amendment which I now propose will be more scientifically correct, and will follow a precedent which has already been set in an Act of Parliament. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 4, line 35, leave out ("includes bird, reptile and fish") and insert ("does not include invertebrates").—(Lord Desborough.)

LORD RAGLAN

My Lords, this Bill deals not with animals in general but with a particular class of animals, called performing animals. Apparently, the noble Lord who introduced the Bill cannot say what he means by a performing animal and apparently the Home Office cannot say what is a performing animal. That being so, they propose to define the word animal as suggested in the Amendment. It is something like introducing a Bill to deal with a particular kind of man and then putting in the definition clause "man means homo sapiens." In the Bill as it now stands the word "performing" has neither meaning nor effect, and if it were removed the Bill would operate in exactly the same fashion.

EARL RUSSELL

My Lords, the word "performing" surely is not the word we are discussing. We are discussing the word "animal," and I am bound to say that had I not seen this Amendment on the Paper I should have put one down myself because it seemed to me last time that to say you are defining "animal" by saying that it included certain other things was almost the exact opposite of the definition. If it did anything it excluded other classes, and I hope that the House will adopt one or other of these Amendments. I am not quite sure whether Lord Desborough's Amendment for the Home Office is the better, or whether that of the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, is. But let us, at any rate, have a definition of the word animal" instead of the one which is now in the Bill which really means nothing.

LORD DANESFORT

Your Lordships will observe that there is an Amendment in my name on the Paper to effect the same object as that of the noble Lord, Lord Desborough, by leaving out the words "includes bird, reptile and fish" and inserting "has the same meaning as that given to it by the Protection of Animals Act, 1911." I entirely agree, however, with the views expressed by the noble Earl opposite. I confess I had some little partiality for that Amendment as a parent for his child, but on reconsideration I find that Lord Desborough's Amendment has real advantages and, therefore, I ant entirely prepared to accept it. It has this great advantage over mine, that it avoids legislation reference, and I think that a county bench of magistrates would prefer to find a definition in the Act under which the prosecution is taken to being told to look for it in the Protection of Animals Act, 1911. In regard to the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Raglan, about performing animals, your Lordships discussed that question in Committee and rejected Iris Amendment dealing with the matter.

THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

My Lords, what is a performing invertebrate? I cannot understand how an invertebrate can be trained as a performing animal.

EARL BEAUCHAMP

My Lords, I think that the House has been unduly rushed in this matter. The Committee stage of the Bill was taken only on Tuesday last and a number of questions were raised, some of them amusing but others of real substance. We have had other things to think of since Tuesday, but your Lordships are asked to deal with this matter on Report to-day, and it is obvious that there are various questions which you are not quite ready to decide. May I suggest to the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, that he should give us a considerable interval before asking us to consider this Bill on Third Reading? As I have said, it was only taken in Committee on Tuesday and several matters which were raised in the discussion then are not dealt with in these Amendments, and I think your Lordships are not even now altogether satisfied. In these circumstances I hope the noble Lord will consider my suggestion.

LORD PHILLIMORE

My Lords, I also had placed an Amendment on the Paper because I really could not under stand the unscientific wording of the Bill as it stood. I think on the whole the Amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Desborough, is the better Amendment and that the other is not so good. My Amendment is, perhaps, not so good, either. I think Lord Danesfort's Amendment by reference is the most remarkable one I have ever heard. I have taken the precaution to look up the Act of 1911, and this is the definition of "animal":

  1. "(a) the expression 'animal' means any domestic or captive animal;
  2. "(b) the expression 'domestic animal' means any horse, ass, mule, bull, sheep, pig, goat, dog, cat, or fowl, or any other animal of whatsoever kind or species, and whether a quadruped or not which is tame or which has been or is being sufficiently tamed to serve some purpose for the use of man;"
and that is not all, It goes on— (c) the expression 'captive animal' means any animal (not being a domestic animal) of whatsoever kind or species, and whether a quadruped or not, including any bird, fish, or reptile, which is in captivity, or confinement, or which is maimed, pinioned, or subjected to any appliance or contrivance for the purpose of hindering or preventing its escape from captivity or confinement. We do not end there, because the expression "horse" has then to be defined, and so forth, but I will spare the House that definition. The Amendment which I have put clown was to leave out "includes" arid insert "means any mammal other than human mammals," so that then it would read "any mammal other than human mammals, bird, reptile and fish"; but I agree that the Amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Desborough, is more scientific and very much more desirable.

THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

If we are to pass this Amendment I should like, by leave of the House, to have an answer to the question: What is a performing invertebrate?

LORD DESBOROUGH

I believe it is a flea.

LORD DANESFORT

May I, by leave of the House, answer the question which Lord Beauchamp raised just now, that it might be desirable to exempt from the provisions of this Bill animals which are exhibited at a charity bazaar?

EARL BEAUCHAMP

I will content myself with saying that was not the point I raised.

LORD DANESFORT

I beg the noble Earl's pardon; somebody raised it, and I was under the impression it was the noble Earl. I may say that we did consider that point, and came to the conclusion that you cannot exempt a man who trains and exhibits an animal because he trains it for a bazaar. That would be very unfair.

LORD MERRIVALE

Perhaps my noble friend will inform the House whether consideration has been given to the question of there being some restriction upon the power of private persons to institute vexatious proceedings under this Act.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

I must call the noble Lord's attention to the fact that we are on the definition clause.

On Question, Amendment agreed to.