HL Deb 21 June 1982 vol 431 cc853-5

[The references are to Bill No. 105 as first printed for the Commons.]

1Clause 6, page 4, line 8, leave out (" and (b) in section ") and insert— ("(b) for subsection (2) of section 21 there shall be substituted the following subsection— (2) The Secretary of State may by order fix a period in each year during which no person shall take or wilfully kill or injure—

  1. (a) any species of deer named in the order other than red deer; or
  2. (b) any hybrid of any species of deer named in the order,

and he may fix a different period for males and females of the species or, as the case may be, of the hybrid so named.";

(c) in section 22 at the end there shall be added the following new subsection— (2) Subject to section 33 of this Act, if any person without legal right to take or kill deer on any land or without permission from a person having such right removes any deer carcase from that land, he shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £500 for each carcase in respect of which the offence was committed or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months or to both and to the forfeiture of any carcase illegally removed by him or in his possession at the time of the offence."; and (d) in sections 22 and ").

Lord Campbell of Croy

My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in the said amendment. It may be convenient if I indicate some convenient groupings of amendments. I hope the House will agree that Nos. 2 to 6 might be taken en bloc; Nos. 7 to 10 en bloc; Nos. 12 and 13 together; Nos. 14 to 16 en bloc; and Nos. 17 and 18 together.

Lord Northfield

That is being suggested without consultation, my Lords. Amendment No. 2 raises quite different issues from No. 5.

Lord Campbell of Croy

In that case, my Lords, I suggest that Amendments Nos. 2, 3, 4 and 5 be taken separately.

I should explain why I am piloting through the last stages of the Bill. My noble friend Lord Glenarthur sponsored it and piloted it through its stages in your Lordships' House before it went to the other place. But today he cannot, for the best possible of reasons; since the Bill was last in your Lordships' House, he has become a Lord-in-Waiting and joined the Government, and I am sure the whole House will join me in wishing him well in his new appointment and I am sure he will acquit himself with great merit in it. In the coming weeks he is likely to spend a great deal fo thime here on the Government Front Bench and he will be lucky if he sees a deer forest for many weeks, even from the air, because his work as a helicopter pilot has also been curtailed by his new appointment. I congratulate him on the passage of the Bill now through both Houses.

The other place found time for it, and they were also able to find time in a committee, so that the Commons have put to us the amendment before us today. I commend those amendments. They do not alter the purposes of the Bill. Indeed, I believe they improve them. The first amendment makes an important addition. Others confirm points which were raised in this House but needed examination before acceptance. We must recognise that deer need to be protected from forms of poaching which can only be described as unscrupulous savagery. The high price which venison can fetch is the temptation. The offenders usually now operate in organised gangs with modern sophisticated equipment designed for wild areas of hill and moor, and the amendment particularly helps to deal with that situation.

The ferocity and cruelty which characterise those activities cannot be excused on any grounds. The House will not be surprised that the Bill has been approved by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. It has also proceeded through both Houses with the close co-operation of the main organisations concerned. The amendment does three things. First, it adds the offence of wilful injury to the offence in each case where wilful killing would be an offence in Sections 21(2) and 22 of the parent Act. Secondly, paragraph (b) fills a gap in the Act by providing that close seasons may be laid down for hybrids as for pure species.

Thirdly, paragraph (c) blocks a loophole that poachers had found in the law. It makes it an offence to remove a carcase from land without legal right or permission. Under the existing law it is an offence to take or kill deer without legal right, but the courts have ruled that "take" must mean taking alive. By this amendment we are aiming to prevent a common device where one man shoots a deer and leaves it for his accomplice to pick up. The amendment puts it beyond doubt that the latter (the man who picks it up) is also committing an offence.

Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said amendment.—(Lord Campbell of Croy.)

Lord Northfield

My Lords, I join with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, in offering good wishes and congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur, and I express our sorrow that he now has to be silent at the final stage of his own Bill. As most of the amendments come before the House I shall not weary your Lordships by repeating how much I appreciate the Government's acquiescence to so many of the points that I raised when the Bill was discussed in your Lordships' House. The noble Earl, who has kindly explained to me that he cannot be here for the remaining stages, may remember being somewhat reluctant to accede to a number of my proposals, and so I feel that for this apparent change of heart the word "acquiescence" is a fair word to use; obviously I am grateful.

I think that all of us in this House are grateful also to Sir Hector Monro for the part that he played when the Bill was being discussed in another place. He was fairly tough with the Government in getting them to accept some of the amendments that they were not willing to accept here. I should also like to express appreciation of the painstaking way in which Mr. John Farr achieved nearly all of his very valuable proposals at Committee stage in the other place. Therefore I would ask your Lordships to accept this one expression of gratitude, even though, as I say, it stretches over most of the present amendments.

I see that the size of the Bill has grown by four pages and the price by 65p since we started. I suppose that that is some tribute to our labours. If it is due to some of the additions that I have consistently moved, then I make no apology. I think that it is a very cheap Bill at the price.

Paragraph (c) of the amendment is an example of the kind of thing that we tried to persuade the Government to accept in earlier stages here. Your Lordships may recollect that the offence of removing an illegally taken carcase was one of a number of additional provisions that I put forward to strengthen the Bill's powers against poaching. While the Bill takes great strides—yes, great strides—towards that end, as I made clear on an earlier occasion, I am still not convinced that it is yet a sufficiently forceful weapon with which to challenge the poaching menace really effectively.

In his early remarks the noble Lord said something about the epidemic of poaching. When I made similar remarks they were challenged from some parts of the Chamber, I think even from my own Front Bench. I am glad that the noble Lord supports me in saying that this really is a dreadful menace to the countryside in Scotland. I still believe that the poaching provisions could be reinforced, and despite the assurances by the Minister, I also think that the powers available to the police to foil deer poachers and to bring them to book are inadequate. However, being grateful for small mercies, I fully support the amendment.