Sir Christopher Chope
MP for Christchurch · Conservative · United Kingdom
“We have now had that review, had the public inquiry and had the outcome, yet we have not had the Government’s acceptance of the clear recommendations to which I have already referred.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Member for West Lancashire (Ashley Dalton), probably about a year ago, she told us that the Government were already reviewing the scheme. We asked her in what respect they were reviewing the scheme, but she said she could not say, although she conceded that they were reviewing it.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I absolutely agree with the hon. Member. It is fair to remind everybody that he participated in the first debate I had on this subject, on Friday 10 September 2021.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful to the Minister for that response and grateful to everybody who has participated in the debate. Nobody can doubt the sincerity of what the Minister said. I hope that she will talk not just to the families but to parliamentarians because this issue affects lots of our constituents.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hope that the Minister will include within her response an explanation of what the Government are going to do to simplify the scheme, stop blocking legitimate claims through technical measures, and ensure that instead of spending another £82 million over the next four years on bureaucracy, we actually use some of that money to compensat…”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“She said that there had been 920 claims by then, but: “The work currently going on is establishing whether there is a causal link between the vaccine and the adverse events that people have been suffering.” —[ Official Report , 2 March 2022; Vol. 709, c.”
House of Commons27 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“The hon. Gentleman misunder-stands the dynamic effects of taxation. I was privileged to be in this House when the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, the late Lord Lawson of Blaby, announced the dramatic reduction in the top rate of tax to 40p in the pound. As a consequence of that reduction, the overall tax yield went up. The burden on individuals was reduced, thereby causing them to work harder to retain their energies for what was happening in our economy, rather than taking their talents overseas. The hon. Gentleman talks about wanting a progressive tax rate in Scotland, but that leads to people becoming collectively poorer. We can see from recent statistics that the Scottish economy is stumbling and failing, because of the misguided policies of the Scottish National party.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Looking ahead to the next Parliament, and hoping that there will be a Conservative Government, can my hon. Friend say to all those in the business community who are watching eagerly that a 25% headline rate of corporation tax is too high, and that we want to lower it?”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Those amendments include one from the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain), who wishes us to go back to the situation that pertained in the original motion relating to the risk-based exclusion of MPs. The original proposal was that Members could be excluded just on the grounds of suspicion. I tabled amendments against that proposal, together with colleagues, and it is to the credit of the Leader of the House that she has come back with a revised motion that makes it clear that exclusion would not begin to apply unless or until somebody had been charged with a violent or sexual offence.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We have, I think, another hour and three quarters, or a little longer, in which to debate this motion. The point I want to make at the outset is this: why are we wasting so much valuable sitting time because of the way the Order Paper is being arranged? Perhaps my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who I hope will respond to this short debate, can explain to us how it comes about that we have the best part of two hours to debate this motion, yet the motion states that we have two hours maximum to debate a much more important motion on Monday. That motion is in the name of the Leader of the House and relates to the exclusion of MPs. We had, I think, four amendments tabled to the Finance Bill, but there are already eight amendments tabled to the motion for Monday, which shows that there is quite a lot of interest in it.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I agree absolutely with my right hon. Friend, to whom I am grateful for supporting my amendments to the original motion. I am sure that it will be of concern to him that the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) has tabled amendment (h) for debate on Monday, which would effectively take us back to the original motion by suggesting that, instead of having to be charged, a Member would only have to be arrested on suspicion of committing an offence in order to be excluded from this House.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I take that point absolutely, Mr Deputy Speaker, but I think we have already had a taste, from the couple of interventions, of the fact that this is a controversial subject, for which two hours of debate on Monday is inadequate. The purpose of this debate is to decide whether we believe that a motion limiting debate on Monday to two hours is the right or wrong course, and I would suggest that it is the wrong course.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It decided in a similar debate that it would be wrong to exclude Members from the parliamentary estate on the basis of suspicion or mere arrest, and that a charge was needed. I submit that it is desirable to have consistent rules across the whole parliamentary estate, because people can move freely between the different parts of the estate, so if somebody in the other place is subject to a different regime from somebody in this place, that will create extraordinary anomalies.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“One issue is that people can be arrested and not know whether they will be charged for months, if not years. During that period, they are in limbo and under suspicion, but are, under the principles of justice in this country, innocent until proven guilty. I think it is reasonable, if somebody is charged with an offence, that the matter is moved on, and that their identity is known. However, quite often, people may be arrested and their identity will not be known. The point I am making is that this is a controversial subject. The new motion that the Leader of the House has brought before us is more in line with what is proposed in the other place, which probably has even more legal wisdom than this House.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Instead, the motion tabled for Monday proposes that a person would be entitled to a proxy vote in those circumstances. The reason I say that is controversial is because it would contaminate the whole proxy voting system. At the moment, a person with a proxy vote is a person who has a condition—either a medical condition, or they are expecting a baby or are the father of a new baby, and so on.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is quite a straightforward point. The Leader of the House has tabled the motion and is faced with a number of amendments, including one on a very controversial topic: the issue of whether we should contaminate the whole proxy voting system in this House by allowing somebody who has been charged with a sexual offence to benefit from proxy voting. Why should they be allowed to vote by proxy? What is the justification for that? If somebody is charged with a sexual offence, they would potentially have bail conditions or custody conditions imposed as a consequence, and provided that there are no bail conditions excluding that person from participating in the proceedings of the House, they should be able to continue that participation. Should that not be the natural consequence?”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I agree wholeheartedly with my right hon. Friend. Indeed, that point could be made in Monday’s debate without the need to discuss the amendments to which I have been referring, but why are we placing a restriction of two hours on a debate on an issue of such fundamental importance? My right hon. Friend’s point is another reason why we should not support a two-hour restriction on Monday’s debate. I do not really understand why that limit is necessary, because Monday’s Order Paper looks very light, as indeed today’s Order Paper has been. At the moment, just a couple of motions have been tabled, dealing with regulations. Why is it proposed that everybody should again have an early night on Monday, and that we will arbitrarily impose upon ourselves a time limit for debating the important issue of risk-based exclusion?”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Madam Deputy Speaker, I absolutely agree. My purpose in speaking to this motion today is to try to illustrate by example the scope of the motion that is down for debate on Monday, and why two hours, in my submission, is an inadequate amount of time in which to discuss such a motion.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Why has it taken so long for it to be debated in those forums? Because it is a complex and controversial subject. It just seems to me that such a controversial and complex subject demands more time than has so far been allocated. However, there is no point in my repeating my points any more, Madam Deputy Speaker, because I certainly do not want to get myself in a position where I cannot be called in the substantive debate on Monday, but I certainly look forward to that debate.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My right hon. Friend makes another very good point. We know that the Leader of the House—and he is a distinguished former Leader of the House—has two hats: they act as a member of the Government and on behalf of the Government, but they also defend the rights of Back Benchers to have issues such as this properly debated. That is why I express openly my disappointment that the Leader of the House has chosen to table a motion that would limit the amount of time for debate, instead of providing reasonable time for such a debate, which could be three hours. That would not be unusual, taking into account the complexity of the issues. To give another example of the complexity of the issue, this has been debated in the House, at business questions, in Committees, and by the House of Commons Commission, for the best part of a year.”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will my hon. Friend emphasise that the debate scheduled for Monday is not any ordinary debate? It is a debate to change the Standing Orders of the House. As was pointed out to me by Enoch Powell when I was first on the Procedure Committee in 1984, in the absence of a written constitution, the Standing Orders of this House are our constitution. Are we really saying that we should change our constitution in a time-limited debate this coming Monday?”
House of Commons8 May 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“He has successfully cross-examined Ministers into the ground and they have been unable to respond coherently, so many congratulations to him.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I would just like to put on the record my congratulations to the right hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) and his hon. Friends on their persistence. Moving Third Reading with the support of the Government and the Opposition is a testament to what can happen in this place if people persist. I remember chairing a Westminster Hall debate in which the right hon. Gentleman and some of his hon. Friends were putting pressure on the Minister of State at the Northern Ireland Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker). Basically, my right hon. Friend was unable to respond coherently to the pertinent points that were being made. No doubt that is one of the reasons why the right hon. Gentleman’s Bill has now gained success.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Let us hope that Baroness Hallett, when she looks at this issue in the public inquiry, reaches the conclusion that the Government did indeed go too far in locking down, restricting freedom and preventing people from accessing education or seeing their loved ones in care homes. That inquiry will reach a conclusion in perhaps five or 10 years’ time—who knows?—but I hope that, if the Government do not support my Bill today, a future Government will be persuaded by Baroness Hallett’s report to do exactly the same thing and ensure the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984 contains proper scrutiny provisions as safeguards.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We also found that those regulations essentially set up a system of false imprisonment, completely in breach of all principles of English common law. There were tremendous restrictions on people’s ability to go out and earn a living, and the reasonable excuses available to them to avoid the lockdown requirements were strictly limited. Let us not forget the consequences for individual liberty, and for a whole generation of young and old people, who were particularly affected by these draconian laws, brought in by the Government under the wrong piece of legislation and insufficiently scrutinised by this House. Let that never happen again.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I referred earlier to the public commentary about this issue. Most significantly perhaps, the noble Lord Sumption gave a lecture in which he expressed doubt about the legal basis for the draconian measures and argued strongly that we need proper parliamentary scrutiny. Another commentator, Tom Hickman KC, made the case not for using the 2004 Act but for having bespoke legislation to deal with such situations in the future. The public health regulations that came into effect on 26 March 2020 set out criminal laws that required each person or household to remain in their homes until further notice. There were very narrow grounds on which people were able to leave their homes. The guidance that the Government issued was, as we eventually discovered through the courts, often over-claimed and overused by the enforcement authorities.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My Bill would ensure that we not only have proper parliamentary scrutiny of the regulations under section 45D of the 1984 Act, but that under section 45Q we introduce a provision that “before such regulations may be made, a draft of the statutory instrument containing them shall be laid before each House of Parliament for a period of not less than twenty days on which that House has sat, and, if either House before the expiration of that period presents an address to Her Majesty against the draft or any part thereof, no further proceedings shall be taken thereon (but without prejudice to the making of a new draft statutory instrument) and that part of the draft shall not have effect unless both Houses by resolution approve it, or, if any modifications in that part are agreed to by both Houses, except as so modified.” The consequence of that would be that there would be no incentive for a Government to introduce restrictions on freedom under the 1984 Act; instead, they would use the Civil Contingencies Act, which was of course set up for that very purpose.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government would have been persuaded that the workplace regulations should have enabled people working during the emergency to try to deliver benefits for the public to be allowed have a cup of tea or a bun together without falling foul of the law. The use of the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984 may well have had the direct consequence—unintentionally, obviously—of depriving the former Prime Minister of his post. When the history books come to be written, these restrictions may be seen as a much more significant decision by the Government, though as the head of the Government, the Prime Minister himself at that time decided to use the 1984 Act rather than the 2004 Act regulations.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As a result, a whole mass of people lost their loved ones without really being able to say goodbye to them, because they were incarcerated in care homes. We must never allow such a situation to be repeated in another health or other type of emergency without the proper scrutiny. When one looks back over the course of this Parliament, it is possible to say that if we had been able to scrutinise the social distancing regulations to a greater extent, the Prime Minister in office at the time of the pandemic would still be in office today. The regulations and restrictions of which he fell foul would not have been in place, because somebody would have asked some sensible questions.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As a result, not only has their education been damaged but their health, welfare and, particularly, their mental health. In my view, that is a direct consequence of this House not having had the opportunity to consider the costs and benefits of introducing such draconian restrictions on people’s ability to participate in their school education. A similar point can be made about businesses being able to carry on what they were doing normally. I visited a garden centre a few weeks ago. In the height of the pandemic it was verboten that people could visit garden centres. For a time people were not even allowed to go to the refuse disposal points to get rid of their rubbish. They were not allowed to venture out and meet their loved ones, even in open spaces.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Clause 1 of my Bill provides that section 45D of the 1984 Act should be amended so that “the appropriate Minister must lay before Parliament a statement that the restriction or requirement is proportionate under subsection (1)”, and that “In the case of English regulations, that proportionality must be demonstrated by a regulatory impact assessment that has been laid before Parliament.” The importance of such a regulatory impact assessment cannot be overstated. We now look back on that period three years ago, and consider the consequences that flowed from the over-zealous restrictions that were introduced by the Government. Almost every day we hear of the adverse consequences for a whole cohort of young people who were excluded from school for extensive periods.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Civil Contingencies Act therefore enables the regulations introduced under its provisions to be amended, unlike the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984. The Government took advantage of that during the pandemic, and I am trying to put it right by including in my Bill provisions to ensure that there is scrutiny so that there will no longer be a perverse incentive for the Government, when faced with a pandemic or similar emergency, to resort to the use of the 1984 Act rather than the Civil Contingencies Act, on the basis that it would suit them to use the former rather than the latter because it would be subject to less scrutiny.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Section 28 is entitled “ Parliamentary scrutiny: prorogation and adjournment”, while section 27 provides for “Parliamentary scrutiny” in other circumstances, stating that “Where emergency regulations are made” under the Act, “a senior Minister of the Crown shall as soon as is reasonably practicable lay the regulations before Parliament, and…the regulations shall lapse at the end of the period of seven days beginning with the date of laying unless during that period each House of Parliament passes a resolution approving them… If each House of Parliament passes a resolution that emergency regulations shall cease to have effect, the regulations shall cease to have effect…at such time, after the passing of the resolutions, as may be specified in them, or…no time is specified in the resolutions, at the beginning of the day after that on which the resolutions are passed… If each House of Parliament passes a resolution that emergency regulations shall have effect with a specified amendment, the regulations shall have effect as amended”.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“He said: “the whole purpose of the 30-day provision in the Civil Contingencies Act was for the Executive to be accountable to Parliament.” The Leader of the House, however, responded to a point that he had made earlier by saying: “we cannot use the Civil Contingencies Act…If we have time to bring forward legislation, it is proper that we do that, and anything we did under the powers of the 2004 Act would apply for only 30 days.” —[ Official Report , 23 March 2023; Vol. 674, c. 132.] Well, that is exactly what the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 is there to do. It was implemented to deal with emergencies even graver than that caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The Civil Contingencies Act was the subject of detailed discussion before its enactment.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Since that time, a number of academic and other articles have been written, and speeches given, in which the concern has been expressed that the Government used the wrong tool to implement restrictions on individual liberty during that pandemic, resulting in this House having an insufficient role in scrutinising that important legislation. This issue was raised, very ably, by my hon. Friend the Member for Windsor (Adam Afriyie) during the original debate on the Bill that became the Coronavirus Act 2020.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time. This is the Bill’s first outing in debate, because although it was presented in the 2022 Session, unfortunately the House was unable to debate it. It relates directly to the beginning of the pandemic and the emergency measures that were taken by the Government and Parliament in implementing the Coronavirus Act 2020. At the time, a lot of concern was expressed about insufficient scope for parliamentary scrutiny under the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984, and how the level of scrutiny available under that Act compared unfavourably to that available under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004.”
House of Commons26 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Eight weeks ago, on 29 February, at first order questions, I asked the Minister without Portfolio what the Government would do to assist people who are adversely affected by the statute of limitations as a result of having been injured by covid-19 vaccines. My right hon. Friend said in response that she had taken the issue to the permanent secretary. Will she update us on what has happened with the permanent secretary over the past eight weeks?”
House of Commons25 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When the Bill comes back from the other place—maybe in another year and a half since it was first presented—we might be on the other side of a general election. Some of us might think it would be better if we did not have the Bill on the statute book by the time of the general election, but that is another story. I will not go into that now. Whenever the Bill comes back, I hope that it will be in an improved form and that even more of my hon. Friend’s amendments, which are well supported on the Government Benches, will be included in the text of the legislation.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hope that the Government will be able to assure us that, as a consequence of this legislation, we will be able to increase the size of the private rented sector rather than diminish it further. I want to conclude by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Anthony Mangnall) on having waged his campaign, although it was not a one-man campaign because a large cohort of people behind the scenes supported of his amendments. As a result of those amendments, the Bill has been improved significantly. One of his amendments was not selected, and that is still, in my view, unfinished business, but we should not shirk from congratulating him on having carried this campaign forward so effectively and successfully.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That consequence is likely to flow from what we are approving tonight, and I just hope that it will be amended in their lordships’ House so that the supply-side reforms, which are so fundamental to the 1988 legislation, can be carried forward and we can give fresh confidence to people who are thinking about entering the private rented market, and fresh confidence to those already in it so that they do not withdraw from it as they are doing at the moment in increasing numbers. It does not help constituents who are trying to get rented accommodation if that accommodation continues to escalate in price. I hope that, if there is to be a response to this short debate, we will be able to have a guarantee that under no Conservative Government will we ever have any system of rent controls.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I fear that the inevitable consequence of this—we have already seen a bit of this in Scotland—will be that, because the Bill will reduce the supply of private rented accommodation, the cost of that accommodation will go up faster than the rate of inflation. The sort of people who have been campaigning in the alliance to which the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) was referring, will then say, “Stop there! We must have rent controls and price controls over rents”, because one set of regulations creates another set of regulations. Then we will be back to where we were in 1977.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There was an amendment that would have brought back something like a shorthold provision to provide privity of contract between a landlord and a tenant who wish to enter into an agreement on a property, in the same way that one can agree to rent somebody’s car or caravan. The principle of privity of contract, which is fundamental to conservative beliefs, was enshrined in an amendment that was deemed to be a wrecking amendment. I hope that that amendment, which was signed by more than 50 colleagues, will be resurrected in the other place, where the rules are different, that the principles enunciated in it will be taken forward and that the Bill will be further improved in the other place. We need to ensure that we support conservative legislation that is designed to increase the size of the rented sector rather than shrink it.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The sector was shrinking, and young barristers like me were making a living by trying to defend the interests of landlords who had haplessly found themselves on the wrong end of the legislation. We have moved a long way since then, and one of the essential elements of the 1988 Act was the shorthold, which was a privately arranged agreement between a landlord and a tenant. For a period, the tenant would be able to have exclusive possession of a property that was rented by the landlord. During that period, neither the landlord nor the tenant would be able to renege on the agreement. The rent would remain the same, and the landlord would not be able to say that they needed to get repossession of the property for any reason at all. It seems to me that the shorthold principle is still missing from the Bill.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a great tribute to my hon. Friend the Minister that he has got the Bill into a form that is far better than it was on Second Reading, and that it is so much improved that there will not be a Division on Third Reading. That does not mean that everybody on the Conservative Benches is satisfied with all of the content of the Bill, although it is significantly improved. I recall the enthusiasm with which those on the Conservative Benches greeted the Third Reading of the Housing Act 1988, which is being substantially amended by tonight’s proceedings. That Act introduced a fundamental supply-side reform and was at the heart of the Thatcher revolution, which transformed the private rented sector from one in which nobody wanted to engage.”
House of Commons24 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hope people will realise that if they do not—I hope that the Government will point this out in the guidance—have their pets microchipped, they will not be able to take advantage of the benefits and special provisions in this legislation.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hope that we can send out a message, in discussing this important legislation, that if someone does not have their cat or dog microchipped, they should not expect the law to rush to their assistance in the event of their cat or dog being abducted. Apart from anything else, if they complain to the police that their dog or cat has been abducted and it has not been microchipped, it is all the more difficult to identify it, search for it and so on. On that great principle of English equity, it seems to me that if someone seeks the protection of the law, they should come with clean hands. In this context, that means they should be able to say that they have complied with the law in respect of the pets for which they have responsibility and have microchipped them.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Following that discussion, I thought I would table a new clause about guidance, so that any references in the debate could include references to the specific issue of guidance that would be issued following the enactment of the Bill. I would like that guidance to set out clearly the position for people who do not microchip their cats and dogs. Microchipping of dogs is mandatory and has been since 2010, but we know that something between 5% and 10% of the 9.5 million dogs in this country are not microchipped. In early June, it will be mandatory for all cats to be microchipped, and probably about 70% have been microchipped by now.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“They will have a better understanding of the way I work than quite a lot of other colleagues. I am pleased that as a result of that meeting there was essentially an agreement—an acceptance—that we must try to link communications about the appalling incidents of pet abduction or theft to the need for people to microchip their loved animals, particularly dogs and cats. In the course of that discussion, it was pointed out by the Minister of State that before the Bill is to become law, it will be necessary for guidance to be discussed with the Crown Prosecution Service regarding exactly what the enforcement provisions would be. I hope that in responding to this debate, my right hon. Friend will expand on that point.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Before I begin to address the issues, Madam Deputy Speaker, may I, on behalf of myself and many others, express our condolences to Mr Speaker, who I know is unable to be present today because he is attending his father’s funeral? I had the privilege of serving with Doug Hoyle in this House from 1983 until 1992, and he was an exemplar for Back-Bench activity during that time. Our sympathies are very much with Mr Speaker. Turning to the amendments, and particularly new clause 1, I thank the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore) and my right hon. Friend the Minister for Food, Farming and Fisheries, with whom I was privileged to have a meeting last week to discuss my amendments.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government obviously believe that pet abduction is an important issue, as indeed it is, but we need to keep it in context with the burden on the enforcement authorities of bringing in new laws and, with that, new penalties and essentially new pressure for prosecutions. That is why the guidance will be important.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The pet theft taskforce was commissioned to look into these issues of pet abduction, and it strongly recommended that something be done to ensure that there is one consistent database for microchipping that is accessible to vets, the police and local authorities. I was pleased to see that the Government have issued guidance, and that there will potentially be new regulations, on that. When we met, the Minister told me that that will come into force before the end of this year. Hopefully that will make the use of the microchip database easier and reduce the costs of enforcement. Obviously, the priority that a Bill or an issue has in the House depends largely on the views of right hon. and hon. Members.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It was with wry amusement that I saw that my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Anna Firth), the promotor of the Bill, has now taken advantage of the opportunity provided by having a debate on Report to put down her own amendments to the Bill. She could not have done that if her original intention of having the Bill go through all remaining stages on the nod had been implemented. I hope she will thank me for that. Since the Bill was first produced, the Government have brought forward some important new measures related to microchipping to deal with the problems of the conflicting or complementary microchipping databases.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will hold my counsel on that until I hear the Minister’s response. If I said now that I agree with the Minister before he has even said anything, I would be closing off an important option. Despite the temptation from my right hon. Friend, I will not do that. She herself has said to me in private that she thinks there is a lot to be said for what I am trying to achieve on microchipping. I have a specific amendment linking microchipping to the text of the Bill. The guidance is perhaps another way of achieving the same objective. My right hon. Friend reminds me that when the Bill came out of Committee, it was originally put on the list of Bills to be considered without debate on a Friday, on the basis that everything that could have been said about it had already been said and it should now proceed directly to the statute book.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend will speak in due course. I will speak briefly to some of my other points. The Bill, as drafted, states: “A person (A) commits the offence of dog abduction if they— (a) take a dog so as to remove it from the lawful control of any person, or (b) detain a dog so as to keep it from the lawful control of any person who is entitled to…it”. It is only after having been arrested for that offence that a person could take advantage of the defence, under clause 1(2), that before the alleged abduction the pet was living in the same household as that person.”
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“I hope that in responding, my hon. Friend the Minister will say that he will do that anyway, so there will be no need to include this provision in the Bill. In our discussion, one of the points made by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State was that he would prefer the Bill to go through the House totally unamended. I suspect, however, that that aspiration has been abandoned, because the promoter of the Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West, has tabled her own amendments. They seem perfectly reasonable, but that would mean the Bill would be amended in this place. If the Bill is to be amended, one or two of her amendments could be a complemented by other amendments, should they be necessary. In that respect there has been a development since our meeting, when nobody declared a need for the Bill to be amended. My hon.”
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“I accept that behind the incidence of pet theft there is organised crime, but in the latest figures that we have, that organised crime has resulted in only some 2,000 incidents of dog theft, compared with more than 130,000 incidents of motor vehicle theft, many of which have been stolen to order. I accept that some of the pet theft we are experiencing is because pets of increasing value are being stolen to order, so I am not saying that we should not deal with that; I am saying that we should ensure that the guidance issued reflects the public priorities and does not divert too much police resource away to concentrate on pet theft rather than other crimes such as motor vehicle theft. That is the background to new clause 1, which would require the Secretary of State to publish guidance on the enforcement of the provisions of the Act.”
House of Commons19 April 2024Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗