Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill

Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Rural Affairs and North Wales, and Trefnydd – in the Senedd at 3:06 pm on 30 November 2022.

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Photo of Lesley Griffiths Lesley Griffiths Labour 3:06, 30 November 2022

I'll refer to the two things separately. So, from a Welsh Government point of view, obviously, our priority is for animal welfare, as set out in the animal welfare plan for Wales. And there are things we can do on our own, but also, within that plan, it includes collaboration with the UK Government and other devolved Governments where there are clear benefits to us doing that.

In relation to the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill, I share your concern about the lack of progress that we've seen. The disruption we've seen and the complete chaos in the UK Government hasn't helped, but we are hopeful. I'm going to try and get some more definitive information from this at the IMG. But, certainly, officials who've met with their DEFRA counterparts are told that, hopefully, there will be a Report Stage date announced soon, because we have seen the Bill stall time and time again. But we are keeping a very close eye on it and, again, I'll be happy to update Members when we have further information, because, clearly, it's a UK Government Bill and they set out the parliamentary timeline.