Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Amendment Bill 2009
I speak on behalf of Family First on the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Amendment Bill 2009. The intention of this bill is to amend the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1979 in order to increase the penalties that can be imposed for offences pertaining to the animal trades and the confinement of laying hens for commercial egg production, as well as to make it an offence not to comply with a notice issued by an RSPCA inspector.
The amendments in this bill will be a step towards improvement of the conditions endured by confined laying hens by increasing the maximum penalty for breaches of the cage regulations. It will also permit higher penalties for breaches of the Animal Trades Codes of Practice, the purpose of which is to protect animals that are used or kept for commercial purposes.
Having to raise the fines and create an offence for failing to comply with a notice issued by an inspector under the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act is a sad testimony to the unwillingness of some operators to treat the animals under their care with agreed-upon standards of basic decency, although I believe for some of the smaller operators it has been a financial burden they have simply not been able to meet. I do not think that punishing them is the way to go; I believe that some compromises should be found.
In January 2008 the new regulations were introduced to improve the welfare of caged layer hens by requiring a little more floor space for cages, and minimum cage heights and cage door sizes. I clearly remember speaking about the issue at that time. These standards were endorsed by the Primary Industries Ministerial Council following extensive consultation with producers and a great deal of debate, and have now been adopted by all Australian States.
Most of the farmers to whom I have spoken—and there have been quite a number—are supportive of the new cage system as well as the increased penalties for non-compliance. However, most small operators believe that they will be put out of business by this new legislation and that the new requirements will not be any better for the hens. They prefer the legislation that is in effect in Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory, Tasmania and South Australia, and they believe that similar legislation should be in effect in this State so that there is some standardisation across the nation.
Farmers have explained to me that the minimum door measurement of the old system is easier to police so that fewer of the hens have their legs broken during their removal from the cages because handlers do not try to take out more than one hen at a time. The larger doors mean that handlers grab several hens at a time and are much more likely to break their legs. Members will note that this injury is due to human handlers’ haste and carelessness, not the cage sizes, and there is nothing in the legislation about handlers’ duty of care.
According to the RSPCA a battery cage is made of welded wire and metal and holds up to six birds. The floor of the cage slopes down to the front so the eggs roll away and out of the cage, and the hens have access to food and water. In the newer system, cages are stacked in several tiers inside a climate-controlled shed, which stays at 20 degrees all year round. The shed may contain as many as 100,000 birds.
The older style systems, such as those that smaller operators still have, allow for hens to push their heads up and out to eat, to peck and to stretch their bodies. That air space external to the cages is not acknowledged when the cages are measured but certainly should have to be factored into the assessment of the total room that the hens have to move around. In comparison, the new system does not allow this extension of their necks, which cramps them and gives them less stretching space than they had before. There is no benefit for the hens at all. The supposedly improved space allocation for caged birds that we are now wanting to better enforce with this legislation is still less.
I ask members to note that I am holding up a sheet of A4 paper, which is precisely the size of each cage for each hen. There is no room for the hens to stretch, to socialise or to lift up their necks. In fact, if they lift up their heads above the ceiling of their cages a belt that is moving constantly above them that is taking excreta from the layer hens above can easily take off their heads. It is a good decapitation device.
The Hon. Melinda Pavey: That is rubbish!
Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes: That is not rubbish because I have seen them and that is the way in which they work.
The Hon. Melinda Pavey: Those are the old cages.
Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes: No, it is the new cages.
The Deputy-President (The Hon. Amanda Fazio): Order! The Hon. Melinda Pavey will cease interjecting.
Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes: I do not mind if the Hon. Melinda Pavey objects.
The Deputy-President (The Hon. Amanda Fazio): Order! I call the Hon. Melinda Pavey to order for the first time. Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes will not respond to interjections.
Reverend the Hon. Gordon Moyes: Confining living birds to such a small space means that they cannot satisfy their instinctual need to perch, to dust bathe, to forage and to lay their eggs in a secluded nest. However, there are positives about the improved cage system, especially for the operators. The hens are protected from eating their own faeces, therefore avoiding infestation by mites and parasites; their instinct to fiercely protect, sit on and hatch their eggs is not triggered since the eggs roll away from them; and the eggs are not laid on the ground, thereby requiring treatment to meet occupational health and safety and food safety standards.
It is less traumatic for them when it is time to be caught by someone who can just reach in and take hold of them; free hens are chased around their open spaces and, naturally, panic. In that respect cages may be more humane.
Many people are horrified when they learn about the conditions under which chickens live, even with the extra space. I have been pleased to note, however, that recently several of the larger supermarket chains have made their own commitment, in response to growing public pressure, to offer more eggs for sale from free range, from cage-free hens, and also from open-barn hens.
I believe that the best option for the hens is to have them housed in a large barn or a shed containing perches, litter, nest boxes, feeders and drinkers, and to do away with cages altogether. My hen house, which is built in this fashion, has a large area in which they can also free range.
Mr Ian Cohen: Do you call it heaven for hens?
Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes: I call them hens but I also have ducks.
Mr Ian Cohen: Hen heaven?
Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes: It is hen heaven. I also note that the State of California has, after popular referendum, passed similar legislation to that which I have proposed. Over a decade ago—in June 1999—the European Union passed a directive on the welfare of laying hens that required the conventional laying cages to be phased out by 2012. Although the level of concern for farm animal welfare varied across the 44 countries in the European Union, being generally stronger in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany and Scandinavia, all the European Union countries will be expected to conform to the new standards by 2012.
Before that directive was passed the egg industry in some European Union member states were lobbying to overturn or delay the ban because they believed it would be economically damaging. However, it costs only a bit more to produce cage free eggs instead of battery eggs, and public surveys have repeatedly shown that most consumers are willing to pay more—as they are currently doing in our supermarkets—for cage free eggs. It was not a decision made on economics but out of appropriate concern for the birds.
It is just a matter of time before members of the public demand these more enlightened standards of care towards laying hens. Free-ranging hens seem to be ideal as they have the freedom they deserve to move around, to stretch, to flap their wings and to socialise. The hens are still making money for the operators but they get to live an actual life for a few years, which all commercial animals should be allowed in an ideal world.
Small operators find that they cannot afford the new larger cages and they say that they will be put out of business if they are forced to move to the new system. The small operators tell me that they believe the cost is approximately $1.5 million to replace their present cages, which they think are better for the hens anyway. They believe that this move will benefit only large producers and that it will put small producers completely out of the market.
The outcome we want from these amendments is not to put small producers out of business or to collect the money from fines; the outcome is to give the birds more breathing and moving space. I think small operators should be exempt from this legislation and/or be given more time to retrofit their cages.
In conclusion, as for making it an offence to fail to comply with a notice regarding an animal issued by an RSPCA inspector, I am rather appalled and astonished that it has not been an offence all this time. What kind of imagined incentive or motivation will make all operators do the right thing if they are not required to heed an order received from an inspector?
Family First will not support the Government’s bill in its current form as it does not meet the needs of small operators. Family First does not want to see small operators put out of business. I believe that small operators should be exempt.