Animals Act 1971 (Amendment) Bill

That is also my concern. My hon. Friend is much more knowledgeable than I am on that matter and I am sure it will be well worth listening to his contribution. The problem is that the lawyers and the courts may not interpret the Bill in the way that we intend. I do not have my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon or anyone else in the Chamber in mind, but I have always had a thing about lawyers because they are the only ones who ever seem to make money these days. We are being crucified over expenses and various other items for which we might not claim. I want to put it on the record that I do not have a £10,000 kitchen, although my wife phoned today and said, ““Does that mean we can get a new kitchen?”” I said no. However, I digress. Lawyers will always interpret things differently. Someone once said that two lawyers together will give two different explanations because they can then both make money. Therein lies a problem. I am attracted by the idea of trying to define things better, as the hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire would like to do, because I would prefer such matters to be tackled out of court, by insurance companies. My hon. Friend the Member for Hendon made some good comments about insurance companies. He said that there had not been many cases under the 1971 Act. That surprised me because I would have thought, given that the hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire is promoting the Bill, that there must have been several cases about which people had a problem. The hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire mentioned the problem of insurance costs for a riding school increasing by a large amount—I cannot remember whether he said that they had doubled—probably by much more than anybody had reason to expect. Those running a business—and a riding school is a business—would probably not have catered for that and would have to find the money from somewhere. That is not right. However, the argument is not with the Bill but with the insurance companies, if they are ripping people off. The hon. Member for Leominster (Bill Wiggin) shakes his heard and he may be right—I am not an expert, but if insurance policies go through the roof and no extra claims are made on them, I cannot understand why they would have to increase to the amount that the hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire suggested.