§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will make representations to other EU member states on recording seizures of CITES-listed animals and their products by weight and number; and if he will make a statement. [124049]
§ Mr. MullinFollowing the CITES Adjournment debate on 21 March 2000 in Westminster Hall, when I was asked to examine whether ivory seizures should be recorded by weight as well as number, I wrote to my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Angela Smith) to let her know that the Government would ensure that future seizures were so recorded. I also informed her that Her Majesty's Customs and Excise had already taken steps, in response to other requests, to ensure that seizures of other high profile endangered species goods such as coral or caviar are also recorded by weight.
Although the CITES Convention is implemented within the European Community by way of EU Regulation, the specific method employed to record CITES seizures is a matter for Member States to determine individually. However, since it certainly makes sense for the European Union to employ uniform, or at least similar, reporting regimes, we will raise this issue at the next meeting of the EU's CITES Enforcement Working Group in September. 194W which case vehicles would no longer have to display the "GB sticker" when travelling in Europe. Regulations to bring this into effect from 1 March 2001 will be laid shortly.