Meeting of the Parliament 18 March 2026 [Draft]
I recognise the commitment of any member who brings forward a member’s bill, and the significant time and resources that that takes. However, without any disrespect to Mark Ruskell, with whom I have worked on many occasions over the past 10 years, it has to be recognised that it is hard to conclude anything other than that this process has been a waste of precious parliamentary time, given that it will not improve the welfare of a single greyhound in Scotland. There is no active track nor on-going racing, yet we are being asked to pass a total ban without ever exploring the very thing that has improved welfare in England and Wales, which is licensing, robust regulation and proper oversight. The evidence has been contested throughout, and the Government has produced nothing new to justify its U-turn from calling a ban “disproportionate” to now supporting it.
Meanwhile, we read reports of a possible legal challenge to similar legislation in Wales before the ink is even dry. That should alarm anyone who cares about good governance and legislative competence.
However, what worries me most is that the bill is portrayed as advancing animal welfare while delivering absolutely nothing in practice. It is gesture politics and virtue-signalling legislation that is designed to look busy rather than make a difference. All the while, genuinely needed reforms languish.
Scotland’s animal welfare law is spread across numerous dated and disjointed acts. A future Government must grab the bull by the horns and develop a proper consolidation bill that brings together the patchwork of existing legislation into a coherent, modern framework that truly improves outcomes for animals and the people who are responsible for their care.
Instead, today, we debate a bill that does none of that. It contributes nothing to welfare and simply reinforces the impression that the Parliament has, to be frank, gone to the dogs, given that such a measure takes precedence over legislation that might make life better for man and beast in Scotland. For those reasons, we will vote against it.