My Lords, I have a number of amendments in this group, but many of them are consequential, so I will not go through them one by one. I have also added my name to Amendment 3, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and I have supported other amendments in this group, such as the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. The reason for this is that, whether we agree that animals should be included or not, there is a wider debate as to when they should be included, how quickly they should be included, and whether all animals should be included or just some. That is why I put down a lot of amendments in this group. It is an area on which we really need to have proper debate and consideration, because it fundamentally changes much of what the Bill is trying
to achieve if you have not just animals but all animals within the Bill, and without any timescales as to when these are going to be included.
I draw noble Lords’ attention to the amendment from my noble friend Lord Winston, because this is slightly different from any other discussion that we have had. It states that the legislation should not apply to equines or rhesus monkeys, for example. He also stressed that he was very cautious about including animals right at the start of the Bill. We will be very interested in the Minister’s response to my noble friend, because it is a different area that he has raised.
I mentioned at Second Reading that I was concerned about the introduction of animals and how they have been included in the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, raised an important point as to what was discussed with the public in the earlier stages that led up to the legislation in front of us. All the secondary legislation that preceded the Bill was really about plants, not animals; likewise, much of the Government’s language and discussion focused on plants, not animals. As the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, said, the consultation that was held by Defra referenced animals, but they did not seem to be the main focus of attention. Moreover, references to animals focused completely on farm animals. Many stakeholder groups were not expecting the Government to include animals in the Bill, which is partly why many are quite taken aback and have raised concerns.
If you look at the Bill, you will also see evidence of the lack of concrete provisions around timeframes: many of them are vague and noncommittal. Much of the preparation that we believe is necessary for a regulatory framework for animals has not yet been properly carried out. In many aspects, the Bill is a framework Bill, with little detail on actual intentions or provisions on its face. It also delegates a broad set of sweeping powers to Ministers, not only to bring in an awful lot of secondary legislation but to amend primary legislation with a Henry VIII clause, which I am sure that, at some point, we will get on to debate.
No one disputes that it would be a wonderful thing to be able to tackle avian flu or PRRS. Of course, if we can find a solution to these kinds of diseases, it would be hugely beneficial—not just in a financial sense, with much of the Bill focused on marketing, but also in terms of welfare.
The noble Lord, Lord Trees, talked about the fact that he strongly supports animals in the Bill. I believe that that is because he is looking at the welfare aspects of this. However, I am concerned that he may be a little gung-ho about how quickly we need to move forward on this. I agree with him that we need to strengthen animal welfare laws. The noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, talked about the importance of breeding to remove disease and produce resistance to disease. I completely understand those arguments, but I am concerned that we may be moving too quickly without the regulatory framework that needs to be in place and without the considerations that we need to have around the inclusion of animals.
The other thing I want to draw the Committee’s attention to is the fact that the European Union timetable also indicates plants, not animals. Have the
Government considered the implications of the EU moving ahead just with plants at this stage if we have animals as well? A large number of animal welfare organisations have expressed concerns; I ought to declare my interest as president of the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, which is one of the groups that has said it is concerned about this Bill.
The RSPCA, which has already been mentioned, produced a particularly good briefing as to what these concerns are. Its thoughts are that, ideally, the Bill should not cover any animals but, if it does, it should be limited to farm animals only. We have heard a lot of arguments today as to why that should be. It also mentions, as one would expect the RSPCA to do, the impact of conventional breeding, particularly on dogs; a number of noble Lords have talked about that. It also says that gene editing in wild animals is done with the express purpose of altering ecosystems, with potentially unpredictable impacts, and that this should always be controlled by the GMO regulations; I would be interested to hear the Minister’s response to that particular comment by the RSPCA. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, also expressed concerns about wild animals.
As the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, mentioned, the other issue is that we need to take the public with us. If we are not careful about how we legislate around the animal aspect, we will lose them. It is terribly important that we are very careful about how we bring in and implement any animal aspects of this Bill, if at all. The Nuffield Council also raised concerns about bringing animal welfare in, stating:
“The welfare of animals is not a characteristic, like growth rate or milk yield, but a consequence of the interaction of biological and environmental factors.”
That is a really important thing to take home with us as we look at how we can move the Bill forward. It also said:
“There is a risk that the focus placed on individual traits in the Bill could distract from this broader consideration of welfare.”
It is terribly important that that concern is built into the Bill.
In our debate on a later group, we will debate the welfare advisory body in the Bill; now is not the time to do so but the question of whether that group is adequate will be a really important part of the Bill, particularly in terms of whether we should amend it to support that concern. Compassion in World Farming also raised concerns about this issue; I will not go into the detail as we discussed this at Second Reading.
I am slightly concerned that it has been suggested that ethical concerns should not be part of the broader debate. I would say that, where animal welfare is concerned, they should be. We must not forget those ethical concerns either.
I mentioned Professor Henderson, the chief scientific adviser at Defra, earlier. I am going to mention him again, because I thought his evidence was particularly interesting in the Commons Committee debate. He said:
“The passage of this Bill has pointed to those problems in animal welfare and made them clearer, and made it necessary to deal with them quite explicitly before we can enact legislation about precision breeding for animals.”
He also said that the process of considering the evidence on animal welfare
“will have to take place before secondary legislation can be enacted. The process for that is laid out in the Bill, and the timescale will be”—
as referenced by my noble friend Lady Jones—
“something like two to three years where scientific input will feed in.”—[Official Report, Commons, Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Bill Committee, 28/6/22; col. 18.]
Where in the Bill is that set out, so that we have that guarantee of two to three years? Neither the process nor the timescales are laid out in the Bill. If we need more time to get the provisions right, why are we not focusing on doing that rather than asking noble Lords, essentially, to allow them to pass and then ask all these questions and put in this detail afterwards? That, to me, is not good legislation. These are big decisions we are making.
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Unless we can exclude animals now or restrict their inclusion, I am concerned that Defra and the Government will be moving forward with legislation before carrying out a very large piece of work that they clearly and self-evidently need to do, as they have admitted themselves. We need to have all of this laid out on the face of the Bill, not just wait for proposals to come forward in secondary legislation at a much later date.
The Minister has talked about the need to future-proof. I absolutely understand that, but we need to have those timescales—those restrictions, if you like—about when things can happen laid out clearly in the Bill. We will come to group 5 on implementation shortly, and I am sure we can look at this further then. There will also be more debate around animal welfare in group 8. However, I am concerned that we are moving forward without the information and the right regulation in place at this stage.