Animals Act 1971 (Amendment) Bill

I would tend to agree with my hon. Friend. We may reach this point later, but having looked at the Bill, in my opinion it may create some confusion. If the proposed amendments to the Animals Act clarify the law, they do so by reverting to the old-fashioned law of negligence, as I understand the Bill's intention. The problem with that is that, although it is tried and tested and has developed over centuries, it provides a field day for lawyers as to what is or is not negligent, what is or is not a breach of duty and whether a duty is owed in some circumstances under the Donoghue v. Stevenson principle. We may talk about snails later and how they got into the bottle of ginger beer. In fact, it was never discovered whether there was a snail in the first place, but that is another story. The basic principles of negligence are wide open for argument. One of my concerns is that if the Bill is enacted we will see a lot more cases going to court with argument about whether the circumstances were negligent than we do under the existing arrangements where we have a modicum of strict liability, which is a lot clearer and more likely to lead to an earlier settlement of claims where people have been injured as a result of somebody else's animal.