Animal Welfare Bill

First, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhill, very much for adding his name to the amendment and for his eloquence. He has spoken often on human rights and I am extremely glad that he has brought his eloquence to bear on this subject. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Soulsby, for his expertise on the issue. I have had a very large postbag, including letters from the Circus Zoological Society, which also has some expertise in the matter. It has been difficult to balance all the opinions and it is very useful to me to hear from the experts in this House. Before Report, I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, and I will seek what is common ground between us in where we are trying to get to. I am also grateful to the Minister for mentioning Amendment Nos. 168 and 169 which, because I was distracted by the Division Bell, I had not addressed. She did that beautifully and precluded any need for me to go further into them, but they raise important points. If we decided to press for something to be written into the Bill on this, there is nothing to stop the Government bringing forward further measures under Clause 12. Should our amendment be fairly modest in scope, the Government could choose to extend Clause 12 by further regulation. In essence, the issue is whether there will be an onus of proof on those trying to prove that something is cruel—for example, if tigers cannot behave as they should normally be able to expect, that is cruel. That is a jolly hard thing to prove. It reminds me of many other debates that we have had in your Lordships’ House, which I shall certainly not go into now. Is it not better for the burden of proof to be on those running the circuses to prove that the species that they are using can happily perform within the confines of the five freedoms? That is the difference between us and the Government at the moment: where the burden of proof should sit. That is what I hope to discuss, too, with the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, in the intervening time. There is a lot of scope for further discussion on the issue and for a wider debate when we come to Report.