Animal Welfare Bill

I am pleased to be able to participate in the debate. I will focus on the reasons why I believe that the only workable and practical way forward is to have a complete prohibition on tail docking with no exemptions for so-called working dogs. As my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Leicestershire (David Taylor) said earlier, it is important to understand the history of tail docking and the reason why it became a common practice for certain breeds in this country. He rightly said that a tax was levied on the owners of working dogs. Farmers, drovers and other owners of working dogs began to dock, or shorten, their dogs’ tails so that they could avoid the tax. The tax was repealed in 1796, but people who were worried that it might be reintroduced continued the practice of tail docking. Prior to the tax, working dogs were not docked. The practice dated only from when the tax was brought in. It is important to appreciate what tail docking actually is. The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons describes the practice as a mutilation, and defines a mutilation as "““all procedures carried out with or without instruments which involve interference with sensitive tissues or the bone structures of an animal and are carried out for non-therapeutic reasons.””" It is right and appropriate to describe docking as a mutilation.