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Chamber and committees

Official Report: search what was said in Parliament

The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.  

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Dates of parliamentary sessions
  1. Session 1: 12 May 1999 to 31 March 2003
  2. Session 2: 7 May 2003 to 2 April 2007
  3. Session 3: 9 May 2007 to 22 March 2011
  4. Session 4: 11 May 2011 to 23 March 2016
  5. Session 5: 12 May 2016 to 5 May 2021
  6. Current session: 12 May 2021 to 23 July 2025
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Displaying 3266 contributions

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Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 24 January 2024

Gillian Martin

I will always appear before the committee if members have concerns about anything in my portfolio. I am not going to sit here and say that I would come to the committee only if there were a formal reason to do so. If you have concerns about guidance, I will come. I hope, however, that that will not happen and I do not think that it will happen because future changes to the guidance will be made in consultation with all stakeholders well in advance of its being changed or published.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 24 January 2024

Gillian Martin

Convener, I have read out the wrong motion. I will revise what I said. I apologise for that mistake

Motion moved,

That the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee recommends that the Code of Practice for the Welfare of Pigs (Revocation) (Scotland) Notice 2023 be approved.

Motion agreed to.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 24 January 2024

Gillian Martin

I do not have a further opening statement to make. I think that I included everything in my original statement.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 24 January 2024

Gillian Martin

The purpose of the draft Welfare of Farmed Animals (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2024 is to amend the Welfare of Farmed Animals (Scotland) Regulations 2010 to put a statutory duty on persons who are responsible for looking after farmed pigs to be acquainted with our new guidance for the welfare of pigs. Among other things, the 2010 regulations require that persons who are responsible for farmed animals be acquainted with any relevant animal welfare guidance and have access to that guidance while attending to such animals. Non-compliance with those requirements is an offence.

Each time a new guidance document is published or revised, reference to that new document must be added to the definition of animal welfare guidance in the 2010 regulations. The draft regulations before the committee do just that. The new guidance for the welfare of pigs was published in November last year. The purpose of the draft regulations is simply to add the new pigs guidance to the definition of animal welfare guidance in the 2010 regulations. The purpose of the revocation notice that is being considered today is simply to revoke the existing but outdated code of practice for the welfare of pigs.

The combined effect of the notice and the regulations will be that the old pigs code of practice will no longer be in force and that the requirements that had been in force in relation to that code will now apply in relation to the new pigs guidance.

I am happy to take any questions that members have.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 24 January 2024

Gillian Martin

Yes.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 24 January 2024

Gillian Martin

Two sets of guidance notes—those on the welfare of meat chickens and those on the welfare of laying hens—have been part of the same process. The committee will have had a letter from me that set out the reasons for the change. We have moved from a code of practice to guidance because guidance can be published, revised and updated very quickly. As you will appreciate, when it comes to animal welfare issues—especially those to do with farmed animals—it is quite a fast-moving scene. We can receive recommendations from bodies such as the Scottish Animal Welfare Commission that we think need to be applied.

The guidance in question is available for people who work with farmed animals so that they can ensure that the welfare of those animals is as good as it can be. The accommodation of such animals and the conditions in which they must be housed are examples of what the guidance covers.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1

Meeting date: 1 November 2023

Gillian Martin

It is a question of whether we have that data. I do not know how we would know how many foxes have been shot as a result of being caught in a snare—I do not know what record keeping would be involved in that.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1

Meeting date: 1 November 2023

Gillian Martin

I completely take on board the convener’s point about scrutiny, and I have said that we will lodge amendments.

Let me go back to our reasons for not putting a ban on snaring in the original draft. We did not do so because of the work that Rachael Hamilton is asking us to do; we were approached by stakeholders who were advocating for us to look at humane cable restraints. That is what we have been doing over the summer: we have been working with those stakeholders and others, we have been taking advice, and we have put out a consultation on that specific issue.

In good faith, I have not steamed ahead and said, “We are not even going to look at that—there is going to be a full ban.” From June to November, we have been doing everything associated with arriving at a final position. We had the round-table meeting and I offered to look at what stakeholders would like to see in a licensing scheme, but that information came back to me only on Monday.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1

Meeting date: 1 November 2023

Gillian Martin

Yes. I was saying they are allowed to be used only in certain—very limited—circumstances by law.

Rural Affairs and Islands Committee

Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1

Meeting date: 1 November 2023

Gillian Martin

Let me go back to my initial point in my statement. Regardless of proposals that have been put to us about licensing—which we need to dig into, and which we need to take time to consider—we believe that more humane methods of wildlife control, such as shooting and trapping, are available to land managers here as they are in other countries across Europe. The Welsh Government and Parliament have also made a decision on that.

I am confident that a ban on the use of snares would not prevent anyone from undertaking necessary wildlife management. As I have mentioned, there are other landowners involved in conservation who do not believe that snaring is necessary. Snares are already used only in very limited circumstances under the current legislation; they cannot be used in situations where they might attract other species or where species that they are not intended to trap might unintentionally get caught. That still happens, regardless of the professionalism of the individual who sets the snare.

That is my starting point. Had we not had calls from SLE to consider humane cable restraints, we would have put that in the bill. That would have been our starting point, and I would have dealt with all of that in the initial evidence session. We are taking the time, however, to do all the work required in that respect.

My starting point is that I am not at all convinced that we can continue with snares in Scotland because of the animal welfare issues with any kind of snare. There are other methods that have been used successfully in other countries in Europe, and we might need to adapt and use those methods, which are effective.