§ LORD BAYFORD rose to call attention to the Report of the Select Committee on Agriculture (Damage by Rabbits); to ask His Majesty's Government whether, and if so when, it is their intention to introduce such legislation as is necessary to give effect to the Committee's recommendations; and to move for Papers. The 121 noble Lord said: My Lords, it may be within your recollection that the Committee to which this Motion refers were set up towards the end of last summer as the result of a Motion in this House. The Committee have since sat, and every one who has read the Report will agree that they conducted their proceedings in a most business-like and expeditious manner and that they have brought before us what is a very moderate but at the same time a very valuable Report. If your Lordships will allow me, I shall very briefly summarise, not all the contents of the Report, but the recommendations that they make. In the first place they suggest that legislation should be introduced to empower county councils, when they are satisfied that real necessity exists, to order a destruction of the rabbits or such precautions as will prevent their causing damage, in cases where the owner or occupier of land has unnecessarily allowed them to multiply. Failing compliance with such an order, the recommendation is that the county council should be empowered to institute legal proceedings against the offender.
§ It is further recommended that the county councils should be enabled to provide trained men with the necessary tackle for the destruction of rabbits. These men could be employed on application for hire or otherwise at the discretion of the county council. The next recommendation is that neighbouring owners or occupiers should be empowered to claim compensation from an offender who keeps so many rabbits that they are doing great damage to the neighbourhood. Then the Committee deal with the question of fencing and warrens, and the recommendation in this case is that a person who keeps a warren for the express purpose of rabbit farming for sale should be liable for fencing. The next recommendation refers to the question of gassing. That is a method of killing rabbits which is still more or less in its experimental stage, and all the Committee do is to express the view that its employment should be legalised beyond doubt. I believe that, as far as it has been worked at present, gassing has been found an effective method of killing rabbits, and every one will agree with the Committee that, if effective, it certainly ought to be legalised. The other subject with which the Committee deals is the very knotty 122 one of gin traps. I know that is a controversial question, but the recommendations of the Committee are, I think, moderate. At the present moment owners, but not occupiers, are allowed to set traps in the open. The Committee are of the opinion that that discrimination should be removed, and further recommend that the Ministry of Agriculture should at once make technical inquiries in order to find a less cruel type of trap. These are the recommendations of the Committee.
§ Your Lordships may remember that when the Committee were set up my noble friend the Leader of the House blessed the appointment and, for a Minister, was rather unusually encouraging about the prospects of dealing with the matter before very long. I would ask him if the Government will not act in this matter speedily. I am authorised to say that the County Councils' Association will support any legislation on these lines to the very best of their power, and, from all I have heard, I do not think such legislation would meet with any great opposition from any quarter. I do not want to exaggerate. I do not want to say that this is one of those questions on which the future of agriculture depends, or anything of that sort, but I do want to say that it is just one of those matters on which the Government, without a great expenditure of time, could really give quite a substantial help. I beg to move for Papers.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (THE EARL OF FEVERSHAM)My Lords, I am very glad my noble friend Lord Bayford has taken this opportunity of calling attention to the valuable Report that was prepared by the Select Committee presided over by the noble Viscount, Lord Mersey. I am particularly glad because it affords me the opportunity to make known how matters stand at the moment with regard to giving effect to the recommendations of that Committee. As your Lordships are well aware, and as Lord Bayford has already mentioned, rabbits are a difficult and thorny subject, and the history of the efforts made to deal with this agricultural pest by legislative action is long and complicated. An examination of the OFFICIAL REPORT will show that during the course 123 of the last fifteen years no fewer than eight Bills have been introduced in this House or in another place at various times, four of which attempted to deal with rooks as well as rabbits, but Rabbit Bills as well as Rook and Rabbit Bills failed in every case to reach the Statute Book.
As Lord Bayford has already said, the rabbit problem is looked at from many different view-points. There is the general conviction that rabbits are an unmitigated nuisance, and that they are destructive of crops and woodlands. On the other hand, there is also a body of opinion that looks upon them as a useful source of food. There is a further body that relies upon the rabbit for the supply of pelts; and there is, of course, the array of humanitarian opinion, with which I am sure everyone in your Lordships' House will sympathise, insisting that if rabbits are to be destroyed the methods used should be as painless as can be devised. This immediately raises the knotty point that Lord Bayford referred to of the gin traps. The Select Committee have given their attention to all the different aspects of the problem, and Lord Bayford has briefly recited to your Lordships the recommendations they have made which would entail legislation. Therefore it is unnecessary for me to refer to those recommendations in greater detail.
As regards the proposals which would require legislation, I am afraid that I am, at the moment, not in a position to make any definite statement in reply to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Bayford, beyond saying—a fact which I am sure your Lordships will fully appreciate—that the present Session is already too far advanced and the business on hand is so congested that there is no possibility of providing this Session legislation for dealing with the rabbit problem. At the same time, I would like to say that, although the legislative proposals of the Select Committee will require some working out in detail, in general they are not such that the Government could take any exception to them, and the possibility of legislation to give effect to them next Session will be very carefully considered by the Department that I represent. I have referred to the difficulties that have frustrated the attempts at legislation in the past to deal with this problem, but I 124 hope that, as a result of the deliberations of the Select Committee, any Bill on the lines recommended by that Committee will have a more successful career than that of the previous Bills on the subject. The noble Lord, Lord Bayford, has referred to the proposals for the making of technical inquiries to find a less cruel type of trap than the gin trap. I would like to take this opportunity of assuring the noble Lord that this question is under the consideration of the Ministry of Agriculture.
I am sure your Lordships' House is greatly indebted to Lord Bayford for having brought this matter forward, and I am very pleased to know that, when opportunity can be found for introducing a Bill, we shall have the full support of the County Councils' Association; for, from the proposals that have been made by the Select Committee, it would appear that the basis upon which legislation would be framed would inevitably throw a large responsibility upon the county councils in the administration of the rabbit problem. I hope that, although this may not be regarded as an entirely satisfactory answer, the noble Lord, Lord Bayford, will rest assured that the Report of the Select Committee is receiving the serious consideration of the Ministry of Agriculture.
LORD PHILLIMOREMy Lords, I rise for only two minutes to emphasise that on this occasion, at any rate, there is a general consensus of opinion upon this matter among all the bodies that are concerned with the land. We have already heard from Lord Bayford that the County Councils' Association are willing to shoulder the responsibility of working some such Act as the Select Committee suggest. A reference to the evidence given before that Select Committee shows that, in effect, the Central Landowners' Association adopted very nearly the same course as the County Councils' Association, and that there is not any very great difference from the views of those bodies in the recommendations of the National Farmers' Union. Therefore, you have the three bodies perhaps principally concerned substantially agreed on the course that should be taken, and that course already favourably reported upon by the Select Committee. In those circumstances I am rather disappointed that the noble Earl who spoke for the Government could 125 not have gone somewhat farther, and, treating this as in all probability a subject on which there will be general agree-merit, have suggested a much more definite possibility of legislation next Session. From what I could gather from his reply there was not even a definite suggestion, let alone a pledge, that legislation was contemplated by the Government. Yet I should have thought, in view of the general consensus of opinion al the bodies concerned, that he could have gone somewhat further and promised us that legislation would be brought forward at some time during the life of the present Government. I do not know whether it is too late to ask him if he can in any way amplify his reply. If he could do so, it would give us more confidence.
THE EARL OF FEVERSHAMMy Lords, I do not think I can substantially say anything further than I have already intimated to your Lordships' House, but I should like to make, clear to the noble Lord, Lord Philimore, first, that the Report of the Select Committee has only been out a few weeks, and that we are seriously considering the technical question of supplying an alternative trap to the gin trap, which is one of the imperative recommendations of the Select Committee. With regard to bringing forward further legislation in the near future, I can only repeat that the proposals of the Committee are having the serious consideration of the Ministry of Agriculture, 126 and if we were assured that a measure would be as agreed as the noble Lord leads us to believe, it would not take much persuasion for a Bill to be introduced as soon as the programme allowed. But I would say once again that eight Bills have come forward in the last fifteen years, and the history of those Bills has been such that we are not led to believe, in spite of the good Report of the Select Committee, that a measure would be so much agreed as the noble Lord has stated.
§ LORD BAYFORDMy Lords, I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.
§ Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.