Baroness Merron:

Moved by Baroness Merron

180: After Clause 56, insert the following new Clause—“Review: offences relating to animal torture content(1) Within the period of six months beginning with the day on which this Act is passed, the Secretary of State must carry out a review of relevant offences under the—(a) Communications Act 2003, and(b) Animal Welfare Act 2006,to determine whether there is an offence of sending a communication to encourage or assist an act of animal torture, or sharing content related to animal torture, on a regulated service.(2) If the review under subsection (1) determines that one or more offences contained within the Acts does extend to such communications or content, the Secretary of State must, as soon as practicable, make regulations to designate the offence or offences under Schedule 7 to this Act (see section 198(3)).”Member’s explanatory statementFollowing answers to a recent oral question (27 June), this amendment would require the Secretary of State to undertake a review of existing criminal offences under the listed enactments to determine whether they apply to online posts containing or facilitating animal torture. If they do, the Secretary of State would be compelled to add these offences to the list of priority offences in Schedule 7.

My Lords, I am pleased to speak to Amendment 180, and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, for adding his name to it and tabling Amendment 180A, which follows it. I am grateful to the Badger Trust, Action for Primates, Wildlife and Countryside Link and the many others who have been in contact about the worryingly high volume of animal cruelty and animal torture content that we see online. I thank the Minister for his engagement on this issue. I very much acknowledge the contribution of noble Lords across the House and their interest in this topic, not only when it was raised in Committee but when my noble friend Lady Hayman of Ullock secured a topical Oral Question on it just last month.

The good news is that everybody agrees that there is a problem here—one that was recently brought into sharp focus by a BBC investigation entitled “The Monkey Haters”. The bad news is that we do not seem to be able to agree on how to address these issues, whether under this Bill or through other forms of action. Users of what will become regulated services once this Bill has passed are using these platforms to discuss, order and share photographs and videos of extreme acts of animal cruelty.

The Government’s position appears to be that, while such activities are abhorrent, they do not generate human harm and are therefore outside the scope of this legislation. In my view, that position is undermined by some of the Government’s own amendments to this legislation, which identify content relating to animal cruelty as falling under priority harms to children. Of course, this measure is a welcome addition. However, as a number of noble Lords highlighted during the recent Oral Question, there is a growing body of evidence that those who engage in acts of animal cruelty go on to harm other human beings.

This amendment contains a modest proposal to review whether the offences already cited from the Dispatch Box apply to online animal torture activity and, if so, to designate those offences under Schedule 7 to the Bill. We accept that the Government are already undertaking a review of criminal offences with a view to expanding the list in Schedule 7, but we have not been able to ascertain the timings attached to that review, whether its findings will be made public or whether Parliament will have a role beyond approving statutory instruments.

In our discussions with the Minister, we had a simple ask: that he commit to including animal welfare issues in the ongoing review and to working with Defra’s Secretary of State to publish a Written Ministerial Statement outlining how many prosecutions have been brought under animal welfare laws, the timetable that applies and how those provisions will be kept under review. We do not consider a Written Ministerial Statement from the Secretary of State summarising government policy to be an unreasonable ask—particularly as this Government are happy to claim that they have done more for animal welfare than any other—yet the Government have hitherto been unable to accept our request. I understand that, just a few minutes ago, an offer of a Written Ministerial Statement was made; noble Lords will understand that I have not seen it as I am in the Chamber, but I am advised that it is not from the Defra Secretary of State and does not refer to the number of prosecutions, timescales or any of the other matters that we requested to be included.

The volume of this content has grown exponentially in recent years. This means thousands of animals being harmed and an even higher number of human beings exposed to abhorrent and horrific material. This amendment may not be perfect, but it will, we hope, encourage the Government to take this issue more seriously than they have done to date. The Minister will be aware that, in view of the Government’s response thus far, I am minded to test the opinion of the House on this amendment. I beg to move.

My Lords, I strongly support Amendment 180, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Merron. I will also explain why I put forward Amendment 180A. I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, who pursued this issue with considerable force through her Question in the House.

There is clearly an omission in the Bill. One of its primary aims is to protect children from harmful online content, and animal cruelty content causes harm to the animals involved and, critically, to the people who view it, especially children. In Committee, in the Question and today, we have referred to the polling commissioned by the RSPCA, which found that 23% of 10 to 18 year-olds had seen animal cruelty on social media sites. I am sure that the numbers have increased since that survey in 2018. A study published in 2017 found—if evidence were needed—that:

“There is emerging evidence that childhood exposure to maltreatment of companion animals is associated with psychopathology in childhood and adulthood.”

The noble Baroness made an extremely good case, and I do not think that I need to add to it. When the Bill went through the Commons, assurances were given by the former Minister, Damian Collins, who acknowledged that the inclusion of animal cruelty content in the Bill deserves further consideration as the Bill progresses through its parliamentary stages. We need to keep up that pressure, and we will be very much supporting the noble Baroness if she asks for the opinion of the House.

Turning to my Amendment 180A, like the noble Baroness, I pay tribute to the Social Media Animal Cruelty Coalition, which is a very large coalition of organisations. We face a global extinction crisis which the UK Government themselves have pledged to reverse. Algorithmic amplification tools and social media recommendation engines have driven an explosive growth in online wildlife trafficking. A National Geographic article from 2020 quoted US wildlife officials describing the dizzying scale of the wildlife trade on social media. The UK’s national wildlife crime units say that cyber-enabled wildlife crime has become their priority focus, since virtually all wildlife cases they now investigate have a cyber component to them, usually involving social media or e-commerce platforms. In a few clicks it is easy to find pages, groups and postings selling wildlife products made from endangered species, such as elephant ivory, rhino horn, pangolin scales and marine turtle shells, as well as big cats, reptiles, birds, primates and insects for the exotic pet trade. This vast, unregulated trade in live animals and their parts is not only illegal but exacerbates the risk of another animal/human spillover event such as the ones that caused Ebola, HIV and the Covid-19 pandemic.

In addition to accepting the animal welfare amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, which I hope they do, the Government should also add offences under the Control of Trade in Endangered Species Regulations 2018 to Schedule 7 to the Bill. This would definitely help limit the role of social media platforms in enabling wildlife trafficking, helping to uphold the UK’s commitments to tackling global wildlife crime.

My Lords, I rise very briefly to support the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, and to make only one point. As someone who has the misfortune of seeing a great deal of upsetting material of all kinds, I have to admit that it sears an image on your mind. I have had the misfortune to see the interaction of animal and human cruelty in the same sequences, again and again. In making the point that there is a harm to humans in witnessing and normalising this kind of material, I offer my support to the noble Baroness.

My Lords, Amendments 180 and 180A seek to require the Secretary of State to conduct a review of existing legislation and how it relates to certain animal welfare offences and, contingent on this review, to make them priority offences under the regulatory framework.

I am grateful for this debate on the important issue of protecting against animal cruelty online, and all of us in this House share the view of the importance of so doing. As the House has discussed previously, this Government are committed to strong animal welfare standards and protections. In this spirit, this Government recognise the psychological harm that animal cruelty content can cause to children online. That is why we tabled an amendment that lists content that depicts real or realistic serious violence or injury against an animal, including by fictional creatures, as priority content that is harmful to children. This was debated on the first day of Report.

In addition, all services will need proactively to tackle illegal animal cruelty content where this amounts to an existing offence such as extreme pornography. User-to-user services will be required swiftly to remove other illegal content that targets an individual victim once made aware of its presence.

The noble Baroness asked about timing. We feel it is important to understand how harm to animals as already captured in the Bill will function before committing to the specific remedy proposed in the amendments.

As discussed in Committee, the Bill’s focus is rightly on ensuring that humans, in particular children, are protected online, which is why we have not listed animal offences in Schedule 7. As many have observed, this Bill cannot fix every problem associated with the internet. While we recognise the psychological harm that can be caused to adults by seeing this type of content, listing animal offences in Schedule 7 is likely to dilute providers’ resources away from protecting humans online, which is the Bill’s main purpose.

However, I understand the importance of taking action on animal mistreatment when committed online, and I am sympathetic to the intention of these amendments. As discussed with the noble Baroness, Defra is confident that the Animal Welfare Act 2006 and its devolved equivalents can successfully bring prosecutions for the commission and action of animal torture when done online in the UK. These Acts do not cover acts of cruelty that take place outside the UK. I know from the discussion we have had in this House that there are real concerns that the Animal Welfare Act 2006 cannot tackle cross-border content, so I wish to make a further commitment today.

The Government have already committed to consider further how the criminal law can best protect individuals from harmful communications, alongside other communications offences, as part of changes made in the other place. To that end, we commit to include the harm caused by animal mistreatment communications as part of this assessment. This will then provide a basis for the Secretary of State to consider whether this offence should be added to Schedule 7 to the OSB via the powers in Clause 198. This work will commence shortly, and I am confident that this, in combination with animal cruelty content listed as priority harms to children, will safeguard users from this type of content online.

For the reasons set out, I hope the noble Baroness and the noble Lord will consider not pressing their amendments.

The Minister has not dealt with Amendment 180A at all.

I will be happy to write to the noble Lord.

That really is not good enough, if I may say so. Does the Minister not have any brief of any kind on Amendment 180A?

I am sorry if the noble Lord feels that I have not dealt with it at all.

The words “animal trafficking” have not passed his lips.

I am sorry; I will have to write to the noble Lord.

My Lords, I am sure the letter will be anticipated.

I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, for their support for Amendment 180. I appreciate the consideration that the Minister has given to the issue. I am in no doubt of his sympathy for the very important matters at stake here. However, he will not be surprised to hear that I am disappointed with the response, not least because, in the Minister’s proposal, a report will go to the Secretary of State and it will then be up to the Secretary of State whether anything happens, which really is not what we seek. As I mentioned at the outset, I would like to test the opinion of the House.

Ayes 211, Noes 171.

Amendment 180 agreed.

Amendment 180A not moved.

Clause 57: User identity verification

Amendments 181 to 183 not moved.

Amendment 184 not moved.

Clause 60: Regulations about reports to the NCA