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Animal Welfare Bill

I understand the noble Baroness’s heart-tugging concerns about primates. Primates are like us in so many ways. However, the thought of reciprocal nit-picking is a stripe beyond which I would perhaps be prepared to go. The noble Baroness said that the codes of practice would not be legally binding. I will be interested to hear the Minister’s response to that. Does the Minister have any information on rescuing primates? The noble Baroness referred to the Monkey Sanctuary Trust. Does that cover all primates or monkeys alone? Is the keeping of primates a bigger problem than some of us perhaps think? Perhaps I may go down memory lane with my noble friend Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville. Many years ago, we competed in gymkhanas on scrubby ponies. In those days, a fancy dress competition would take place. Bearing in mind the conversation which we had about circuses only yesterday, it may be distasteful to say that we went as circus performers. My sister was decked out as the ring master. Two of us sat behind her on the pony. We represented everything that went on in the circus. The reason I mention this is that we had a monkey which came along with us. He was all right to start with, but grew fed up after we had done one or two shows and decided to bite us. So we had to replace the monkey with a dog. The dog used to come along and quite enjoy it. That sounds pretty flippant, but I do not mean it to be. It was years ago, and the monkey was well looked after by the family. However, clearly it did not like having to take part in that activity. I wonder about the way in which primates are kept and used, in the broadest sense, and what knowledge the Government have on things that affect the keeping of primates. Will the Minister be able to give us more direction on the numbers of primates that are kept and how many fall into difficulties?