My Lords, I speak to this amendment in my name, so ably led by my noble friend Lady Fookes. It enables us to put an end to much suffering incurred by thousands of animals over the years when they are exported for slaughter.
Animals have to endure many hours of transport to meet their end. While I understand that the EU has comparable slaughter regulations, not all countries oversee these with the rigour they should. A report in September 2016 by a committee of inquiry of the French Assemblée Nationale confirmed that there were serious welfare problems and breaches of EU law on welfare at slaughter in French abattoirs.
Exporting animals for slaughter is simply a welfare insult. As we have heard, the long journeys are stressful for the animals and in some cases result in enormous suffering due, for example, to overcrowding, high summer temperatures and animals receiving injury en route. As mentioned in debates on other amendments, animals should be slaughtered at the closest possible point to production. In this day and age, there is no reason why they cannot travel on the hook, rather than on the hoof.
Figures provided by the Animal and Plant Health Agency show that around 40,000 animals were exported last year. Of these, I understand that around 30,000 were sheep, with just over half going to the continent.
These animals are mostly going to France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, but some are going to Hungary and Bulgaria, which have a large onward trade to the Middle East, where slaughter conditions can be simply terrible.
The proposed new clause also bans export for fattening. APHA figures show that 3,446 calves were sent from Scotland on long journeys to Spain and Italy in 2017, to be fattened for beef and veal. I gather that a number of English calves have also been sent. Not only does scientific evidence indicate that young calves are not well adapted to cope with transport; they may end up being kept in systems that are illegal in the UK on welfare grounds. It is therefore important that the ban included fattening as well as slaughter. Otherwise, animals will be exported for fattening that will then result in slaughter.
There will be limited impact from this clause on British farming, because the numbers are small when compared with the UK herd size. As my noble friend has mentioned, banning exports for slaughter was in our Conservative manifesto. The Bill is the perfect place to bring in this provision. While I understand that there may be some work to make this happen, that is no reason to delay the legislation. This trade is cruel, and if the UK wishes to consider itself to be a country leading in animal welfare, it needs to act to stop such practices now. I therefore hope that the Government will use this opportunity to back a ban on live exports for slaughter and fattening, due to the extensive suffering that it causes, and accept the amendment or undertake to work to bring something similar forward at the next stage of the Bill.