Recent reports suggest that the promised UK fur import ban may be dropped from the forthcoming “Animals Abroad Bill” a broad sweeping Bill which remains – much like our Prime Minister – mostly soundbites and completely lacking in substance. The reasons for this broken promise – which includes the absence of a foie gras ban seem to be down to the influence of a few out-of-touch ministers, notably one Jacob Rees-Mogg. Hopefully, the current uproar will help the Prime Minister switch his self-preservation allegiance from Mogg to the people who elected him. The fact is that these are the people who can oust him before the next general election, not the general public. And Boris Johnson is happy to do whatever it takes to cling on to power and that means pleasing his backbench and front bench ministers, not the general public, yesterday’s announcement of an end to Covid restrictions was greeted with cheers and an increase in popularity with his own backbench.
The casual politically directed casting aside of the ban on fur imports is even more frustrating when you look at our historical role. Britain was once a world leader, it banned fur farms in 2000 (England and Wales) and 2002 Scotland and N Ireland) and it also restricts fur imports of cats and dogs, seals, and some wild trapped animals, so it would seem an obvious add-on to our laws, and one which has the added validity of zoonotic disease risks to boot.
But British animal welfare is not a one-way street – both the ongoing badger cull and the bizarre and heavy-handed treatment of an alpaca named Geronimo, demonstrate the inherent hypocrisy in government policy – as well as the power of the farming lobby – over commonsense and scientific proof. And then, there is the fact that we still purchase bearskin hats for the Queen’s Guard. This is no small investment, according to a report in The Independent “The government spent more than £1m of taxpayer money in seven years on bear fur hats for the military, official figures show”
Furthermore, our historic fur farm industry continues to wreak havoc in our countryside, thanks to the escapees from the estimated 700 fur farms that had sprouted up all over Britain before the ban was implemented, containing some 100,000 mink. Mink, having escaped under their own steam or with the help of well-meaning but ill-informed animal liberation activists have thrived in the British countryside, decimating our native water vole populations, as well as mallard, coots, moorhens, and kingfishers.
As well as finding itself plenty of food in the British countryside, the mink doesn’t have a native predator, and it has happily multiplied. The otter is the only potentially controlling natural factor in Britain and as we had already decimated the otter populations in Britain the mink has had free reign to multiply and as a result – and in spite of many culling interventions, the American mink currently has a wild population of approximately 110,000 in the UK.
Fur farming is however on the way out across Europe, with many countries already having banned the industry, or are in the process of phasing it out. Coronavirus has speeded up the end of this industry in the Netherlands, where coronavirus outbreaks initiated a cull of some 600,000 of the 800,000 mink still farmed there. In the Netherlands, compensation for mink farmers is still being negotiated. France and Italy announced bans recently, France accelerated its phase-out plan at the end of last year following pressure from campaigners to close its last mink farms.
So back to Britain, high on promises, low on action as encapsulated in the fact that “the world-leading ivory ban” is still yet to pass into legislation, 3 years after gaining Royal Assent.
Foie gras it seems will stay on the menu of the likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg, perhaps consumed wearing an imported fur coat, and all because Mr Johnson knows how to save his own skin. What a sickening thought.
Siobhan Mitchell 