I beg to move,
That this House has considered the matter of live animal exports and animal welfare.
It is a great pleasure to open this debate, which was requested by a cross-party group of Members. I want first to thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting us a debate on this extremely important issue. It is an extraordinary thing: Britain can have extreme pride when it comes to animal welfare—we have a strong sense of tradition. This is the country that passed the first piece of legislation on animal welfare—I believe it was in 1635—when we prohibited the pulling of wool off sheep and forbade the attaching of ploughs to horses’ tails.