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Mrs. Beckett: I believe that the question about what is in order is not a matter for me, but I suspect that that is not the point that the right hon. Gentleman is seeking to make. The role of the Prime Minister's official spokesman is well known. He is highly respected. We all take note of the fact that the Tory party so much dislikes his efficacy in that role that hon. Members do everything that they can to undermine him.
Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire): I congratulate the right hon. Lady on the ingenuity of that answer. I have two points to raise with her. First, following up a point made earlier, will she reconsider having a free vote at the end of next Thursday's debate so that every right hon. and hon. Member can express an opinion on a report which, in effect, proposes the destruction of our parliamentary system, so that she herself can be free, unfettered and unshackled and can tell us what she thinks about such a monstrous proposal?
Secondly, on a point that will unite the House, I am sure that the right hon. Lady will agree that it is a great pity that we have been unable to debate early-day motion 1647, headed "Speaker's Chaplain".
[That this House notes that the Reverend Canon Donald Gray is to retire at the end of the current session after 11 years as Chaplain to the Speaker; pays warm tribute to his years of service to this House both in his formal duties and in his less formal but equally important ministry to honourable Members and staff throughout the House (including his support to the Parliamentary Christian Fellowship); notes also that he and his wife Joyce having made many friends in and outside Parliament, will be greatly missed; and wishes them both many happy and fulfilling years in their retirement.]
The right hon. Lady will know that, this afternoon, Canon Gray conducted Prayers in the House for the last time. Does she agree that it would be appropriate for us all to place on record our great respect for Canon Gray and our profound gratitude for the service that he has rendered to the House, to all right hon. and hon. Members in a pastoral role and to so many of the staff of the House and the other place who have gone to him for counsel and help? He has been an exemplary Speaker's Chaplain and it is appropriate for that to be put on record before we move on to the next business.
Mrs. Beckett:
The hon. Gentleman asked me for a free vote at the end of the debate next Thursday. It is not the end of the debate or the discussion; it is very much the beginning. It is certainly my view and that of the entire Cabinet that we would like widespread and thorough debate on the issues raised by the Jenkins report.
I thank the hon. Gentleman very much for his remarks about the Speaker's Chaplain and for giving me the opportunity--which might not otherwise have been in order--to say how strongly I share his views, which I know are shared by all right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House. The Speaker's Chaplain is held in not only great respect but much affection. The hon. Gentleman referred quite rightly to his pastoral role and his work with staff and with right hon. and hon. Members. If one may put it this way, he has adorned the House for a long time and we shall always find Prayers very different and for some time a little strange without him. I hope that he will be aware of how highly he is regarded and certainly, if that were not the case, I hope that it will be now.
Mr. Michael Fabricant presented a Bill to establish a Parliamentary Commission to investigate the benefits or otherwise of accession by the United Kingdom to the North American Free Trade Area Treaty; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Thursday 19 November, and to be printed [Bill 251].
The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Nick Brown):
This is the first parliamentary occasion on which I have had the opportunity to welcome the hon. Member for South Suffolk (Mr. Yeo) to his new role as principal Opposition spokesman on agricultural matters and I do so now. I know that he will be a robust opponent on party political issues, but on issues of national importance that transcend party politics, such as the date-based export scheme, I hope that I can count on him as an ally.
Today's debate is not party political, although it involves matters on which people hold very strong views. Since becoming Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, much of my time has been consumed by the specific difficulties faced by farmers and the Government's desire to do what we can to respond; Agenda 2000 and the wider search for common agricultural policy reform; and, of course, the beef export ban, on which I have set myself the target of getting the issue resolved before Christmas. I am absolutely determined that the intense focus on those priorities will not divert me or the Department from our other responsibilities, especially food standards and the protection of the public.
Our quarantine laws, and the case for their modernisation and reform, are one aspect of public protection. I am grateful to the Leader of the House for her having secured Government time for the debate. The views of individual hon. Members are especially important on an issue such as this one, in which there is no obvious party political divide. The British people are internationally famous--or notorious--as animal lovers. We keep pets as part of our families, and we object to forced separation. It is no surprise that the requirement of six months in quarantine for dogs and cats entering the United Kingdom has always been unpopular among pet owners, especially those whose work commitments require them to travel abroad. That has a particular application for the armed services.
There are good reasons for quarantine, however. Rabies is an appallingly unpleasant disease which still causes many deaths in some parts of the world. It is right to take strict precautions against it. I am not willing to recommend to the House anything that puts our population at risk from rabies. Nor am I willing to put to the House anything that would inflict rabies on our wildlife or our pets. There has been no native case of rabies among animals for more than 75 years, and it is 95 years since someone last died of the disease after contracting it here.
We maintained that record during a period in which an epidemic in wildlife made rabies common on continental Europe. It is no longer common, however. A successful campaign is pushing the disease back beyond the frontiers of the present European Union. Western Europe is now
largely free of rabies. There were only 100 cases last year in animals other than bats, compared with 14,000 cases in 1989.
We must also take into account the freedom to travel that people now enjoy. Holidays abroad are part of modern life. In particular, the channel tunnel has made travel easy. Against that background, we must ask whether our arrangements are still justified. In 1971, the Waterhouse committee recommended retention of six months quarantine as a standard requirement. In 1994, the Select Committee on Agriculture had a fresh look at the subject, and it reported that vaccines were available for the prevention of rabies, that blood tests could show whether the vaccine had taken and that microchips could identify whether an animal was the one mentioned in a vaccination or blood test certificate. The Select Committee concluded that
The then Government welcomed that report, but concluded that the changes proposed were premature. The Conservative Government argued that the eradication programme in the European Union had not been completed. They said that new arrangements for importing traded cats and dogs to the UK were still untested. They said that similar relaxations recently introduced in Norway and Sweden were also untried.
Whatever the case may have been at that time, those objections surely have little force today. Highly respected bodies--including the British Medical Association, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the British Veterinary Association--have argued that the time has come for a re-evaluation.
When we came into office, the Government were aware of strong opposition to quarantine among many pet owners, but aware also of deep fears among those who support the existing system. To help to reconcile those views, my predecessor called for a scientific assessment of the risks that we run under the policy of quarantine and under five other options. It is, perhaps, remarkable that that had not been done previously, and I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend, now the Minister for the Cabinet Office, for his decision. Professor Kennedy chairs the advisory group on quarantine that conducted the review. On 23 September, I published his report "Quarantine and Rabies: A Reappraisal". The report is an excellent and thorough analysis which gives a sound basis for conducting the public debate. I commend it to the House, and am most grateful to Professor Kennedy and all the members of his group.
The essence of the report lies in the first two of its 41 recommendations. It recommends an alternative system for bringing pets into this country from the European Union, European Economic Area and rabies-free islands. For such animals, the alternative system gives safeguards equivalent to quarantine, which would be abandoned for those areas. That would apply both to pets taken from Great Britain to those countries and then returning, and to pets coming into Great Britain from those countries if they satisfy the same conditions.
[Relevant documents: The fifth report from the Agriculture Committee of Session 1993-94, on Health Controls on the Importation of Live Animals (HC 347-I, published on 23 November 1994).]
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Betts.]
4.12 pm
"scientific advances since the Waterhouse Report now make it not only feasible, but desirable, for the UK to permit anti-rabies controls based upon vaccination and blood-testing as an alternative to quarantine for pet dogs and cats arriving from other EU countries and all other countries internationally recognised to be rabies-free and carrying out appropriate policies to maintain their rabies-free status".
That report is before us today to help inform our debate.
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