HL Deb 27 October 2004 vol 665 cc1329-31

(1) An individual may apply to the registrar to be entered in the register in respect of hunting which he proposes to carry out.

(2) An applicant must be at least 16 years of age.

(3) Where an applicant is younger than 18 years of age, his application must be countersigned by a parent or guardian.

(4) An application must—

  1. (a) be in the prescribed form,
  2. (b) contain the prescribed information,
  3. (c) be accompanied by the prescribed documents (if any), and
  4. (d) be accompanied by the prescribed fee.

(5) An application must specify—

  1. (a) the species of wild mammal which it is proposed to hunt, and
  2. (b) the area in which it is proposed to hunt.

(6) An application may specify a condition to be included in the register as a condition of the proposed hunting.

(7) In this section "prescribed" means prescribed by regulations made by the Secretary of State."

The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 21, I shall speak also to the amendments grouped with it. The amendments all seek to reinstate the parts of the Bill that deal with applications for registration. In view of the exchanges that have taken place, I hope the Committee will not think me discourteous if I take them very shortly; all the amendments are set out clearly on the Marshalled List and are largely self-explanatory.

Amendment No. 21, which deals with applications by individuals, is in the form of the original government Bill as amended in Committee. The amendment there was to lower the age at which an applicant could make an application from 18 to 16; but where an applicant is younger than 18 his application has to be countersigned by a parent or guardian.

Amendment No. 24 is identical to the original government Bill, as introduced by Mr Alun Michael, as is Amendment No. 34, which deals with the handling of applications. I believe that Amendment No. 35 follows the Government's original wording; I shall be corrected if I am wrong. It is just possible from my briefing that it may include a change made at the Committee stage, but I believe it to be the original wording introduced by Mr Michael with the government Bill in 2002. Amendment No. 37 is identical to the original government Bill, as is Amendment No. 38, which deals with the variation of non-automatic conditions.

If noble Lords have questions about the operation of any of those parts of the Bill, I shall do my best to deal with them, but I will be largely reliant on the Government's Explanatory Notes, which are, in effect, my briefing. I hope that I have not taken the matter too shortly. With those comments and a desire to help anyone who has queries, I beg to move.

Lord Whitty

For the guidance of the Committee, my noble friend is correct that, in general, all the amendments in this group follow the terms of the original Bill with the one exception to which she referred—Amendment No. 21—which was changed in Committee to the form in which it appears in the amendment.

However, there was also an amendment to the ground covered by Amendment No. 24. This relatively simple amendment, which was made in Committee, extended the period in which an unsuccessful application for registration could be made again from the original six months to 12 months. That is not a huge issue of principle, but it shows that we are in a pick-and-mix situation so far as concerns the amendments introduced in Committee in the Commons. Apart from that, my noble friend is correct that the amendments reflect the terms of the so-called Alun Michael Bill.

On Question, amendment agreed to.

5.45 p.m.

Lord Mancroft moved Amendment No. 22:

After Clause 5, insert the following new clause—