My Lords, I will rise very briefly because I have added my name to Amendments 50 and 87. I very much support the comments that have already been made by the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, and my noble friend Lady Hayman, in proposing those amendments. I do think that—this has been a bit of a running theme, really—the lack of information about the composition and functions of the welfare advisory committee, which was flagged up at Second Reading and has again been flagged up quite widely today, is important. It is also important for us to really understand how the functions of that body will relate to other committees that are already in existence or envisaged in other bits of legislation. They will not stand alone in isolation: we need to know how they will interrelate.
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We have made it clear that the measures relating to the animal welfare elements of the Bill are simply not well developed. As we heard in the previous debate on Monday, a number of us felt that on that basis they should be taken out of the Bill altogether until more detail was available. But, moving on from that finite position, we are now trying to make more constructive proposals about alternative ways of addressing this.
Amendment 50, which is in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, focuses on the composition of the welfare advisory body itself. As the Bill stands, given that there is very little information, the functions of the welfare advisory committee could go to any number of existing welfare bodies, or indeed to one set up for this purpose. There is a proposal that the functions could be absorbed by the Animal Sentience Committee. In the Commons debate in July, the Minister reported:
“Applications to the committee have now closed … We very much hope to have the committee up and running by the end of this year.”—[Official Report, Commons, 7/7/22; cols. 261-62.]
So I am genuinely interested to know from the Minister whether he could update us on this. Is this committee in existence now, and is it being prepared to take on these duties? Six months have passed, so presumably the Government’s thinking has become more advanced on that.
So far, we have had very little reassurance about the expertise or competence of those that the Secretary of State is thinking of appointing to this role. But if they are there, and are people that we trust, we may take a different view. The amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, makes it clear that we expect members of the committee to have a broad range of backgrounds and knowledge, which would enable them to come to a full and rounded view of the welfare implications of their decision. It also, as she said, provides for a lay member. I do think that that is important, because a lot of this discussion, as we have said before, is about public reassurance, and having a lay member there will
provide some of that reassurance. It will also reassure the public that any decisions are not based on a narrow set of interests.
I only say this in relation to the other committee that we have referenced several times now—the ACRE committee. That committee is, I fully acknowledge, made up of people with a particular scientific expertise in their field, but six out of the seven scientists on the board of ACRE have links to commercial companies as well, and three of them quote Syngenta as an interest. My point is that we do not want to replicate this, or have a different body where there are those potential conflicts of interest that could cause members of the public to perhaps not have as much confidence in the committee’s decision-making as they should. I am sure that those people mean well and that they have scientific knowledge, but they also have to operate on an independent basis.
I think that my noble friend Lady Hayman has made the case very well for Amendment 87. It just makes it clear that the commencement date should not be enacted until we do understand more about the welfare advisory committee. As she says, it needs to have a remit which goes beyond the specifics and is able to deal with the direct and indirect impacts, and also unforeseen consequences —so, again, her arguments and the amendment are well made.
Finally, I will pick up on the masterclass from my noble friend Lord Winston. I would not even begin to try and argue with him; I sit in awe of everything that he is saying. I do hope that the Minister will meet him and talk some of these things through, because I do think that he has genuine expertise that he can share which will improve the substance of the Bill. I hope that the Minister will work with him on that basis.
I will pick up on the discussion about whether the research was taking place in a farmyard or a broom cupboard. I did note that Amendment 72A, the latest amendment from my noble friend Lord Winston, puts a specific requirement on participants in the research to have the appropriate scientific qualifications before they go anywhere near a petri dish. It would be reassuring to know that those people will have that expertise. I thought that was a helpful amendment as well.