I see the Minister shaking his head and I know that he will come back on that issue. I am glad to see him suggest that that will not be a problem. He will explain today why that is the case.
Will there be adequate resources? I asked on the Floor of the House whether the problem with the dog control notice is that it instantly sends shockwaves through Whitehall and down to local government that resources must follow. If that is the case, let us be honest about it. If that is the problem, which it is, and if we agree on the scale of the challenge and the need to turn things round, which we do, let us have a frank discussion about how we resource this. We have rising dog attacks, injuries and fatalities; rising kennelling costs for local authorities and the police; and more people washing up in A and E units and costing the NHS money. It has to be resourced; otherwise, we can pass all the legislation and regulation and employ all the nudge factors or whatever in the world, but we will not have an effect on the ground, as the hon. Member for The Cotswolds pointed out.
In the absence of dog control notices, how will the Minister ensure that the measures he proposes, among the plethora of measures in the Home Office Bill, will be adequately understood, not only by the police and community safety agencies, which are expected to enforce them, but by the public, who will come to our constituency offices and say, “We know of a problem,” or by a postal worker who says to my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West, “We’ve identified a dog; I don’t know what to do about it.”? Will it be properly explained and understood, so that they can use the mechanisms at hand?
Are the measures too bureaucratic? One great advantage of a flexible early intervention approach is that we can get in early, without having to go back to a magistrates court or get another type of permission that requires 20 forms to be filled out. There can be early, gentle, soft, clever interventions, such as, saying to an owner, “He hasn’t done anything yet, but there is a problem. You’ve had a visit from the RSPCA and the local health worker. They have both said that there is a problem. When you have visitors in your property, will you please muzzle that dog. What you do otherwise is up to you.” Will it be that sort of approach, or will a massive bureaucracy have to be gone through to take any action under the proposal?