My Lords, I feel a little torn, having read the amendment, because I would heartily support it. In fact, I proposed two Private Member’s Bills which set out many of the provisions in the amendment. I would support the amendment, but we are where we are, with the Government having proposed the legislation. I have been working with organisations such as the Dogs Trust, the Kennel Club, Blue Cross and others for four or five years now, so I know their commitment to dog control notices. I believe that the Government have taken on board a large number of the arguments put forward. The department should be commended for the amount of work it has done to listen and to propose amendments to deal with some of the concerns raised about the Bill as drafted.
The noble Baroness, Lady Gale, has a very good point. It would be wrong not to say that I think in my heart that dog control notices would be an excellent idea. However, I believe that the Bill will now go a great deal of the way to meeting many of the assessments that we set out. It sets out to defend assisted dogs for the blind. It sets out to deal with the issue of dog
attacks in private residences. It sets out clearly in the guidance how the local authority should try to deal with many of the issues.
Obviously, this is a complicated piece of legislation and we are changing 11 other pieces of legislation to fit it in. I would have preferred a separate piece of legislation on dogs. However, that was met with hostility from all sides of the House when I raised it a number of times—