The effect on animals has been raised with me, and I shall come to that in a moment.
Let us also remember the effect on people. Last year in England alone there were 4,436 visits to A&E by people with firework injuries. That is more than double the figure of 2,141 in 2009-10. There were 168 admissions for firework injuries in 2015-16 and 184 last year. Admissions had been going down but they are now going up again. Let us remember that some of those will be catastrophic, life-changing injuries. The cost to the person concerned is incalculable, but there is also a cost to the NHS, through the strain on our A&E departments as more people are admitted. I know that family members who work in the NHS dread 5 November as much as firefighters do, because they worry about the injuries that they will see. Some are so bad that the British Association of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons has called for fireworks to be sold in boxes displaying pictures of injuries, rather than in what looks like packaging for sweets. It is certainly right about the packaging.
As well as injuring people, fireworks are a problem for animals, as several hon. Members have mentioned. I have been contacted by a number of people who say that their pets have to be sedated when fireworks are going off. They are supported by a number of charities, including the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the Kennel Club and the Dogs Trust. It is fair to say that not all these charities are asking us to move to public displays only. The RSPCA wants the decibel limit reduced to 97 and would like the use of fireworks, not simply their sale, restricted to certain times of the year. It also calls for all public displays to be licensed and for residents to be able to object to the licence—something I will return to later. By contrast, the Dogs Trust would like us to move to public displays only.
Noise has an effect not just on animals, but on people. It particularly has an effect on elderly people and those with mental health problems such as post-traumatic stress disorder. Shoulder to Soldier is a charity that originated in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Jo Platt), and which also has an office in Howley in my constituency. It has campaigned vigorously to make people aware of the effect on some veterans of having fireworks let off near them and has been supported in that campaign by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents.
With the noise goes pollution. For the five days around 5 November, particulate pollution was very high in this country. On 5 November itself, towns and cities across Britain, such as Stockton, Leeds and Sheffield, reached level 10, the maximum level of pollution.