CO885-(13-15) — Page 297

21345.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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C.O.

Reference :-

885

14 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-

COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

ら

GENTLEMEN,

No. 22.

(CANADA.)

COLONIAL OFFICE to LAW OFFICERS.

Downing Street, November 3, 1892.

I AM directed by the Marquess of Ripon to request your opinion upon the following case :—

1. By section 35 (3) of the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act, 1878 (41 & 42 Vict. c. 74), the provisions set forth in the Fifth Schedule to that Act apply to foreign animals, the landing whereof is not for the time being prohibited by Order of Council made under that section.

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2. The said Fifth Schedule provides in Part I. (paragraph 3) that foreign animals are not to be moved alive out of the wharf at which they are landed: it further provides (Part IV., paragraph 11), that in relation to foreign animals other than those brought from the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, "if and "as long as, from time to time, the Privy Council" (whose powers and duties under the Act are now vested in the Board of Agriculture) are satisfied with respect to any foreign country, that the laws thereof relating to the importa- tion and exportation of animals, and to the prevention of the introduction or spreading of disease, and the general sanitary condition of animals therein are such as to afford reasonable security against the importation therefrom of diseased animals, then, from time to time, the Privy Council, by general or special Order, shall allow animals, or any specified kind of animals, brought from that country. to be landed, without being subject under the provisions of this Schedule, to slaughter or quarantine, and may for that purpose alter or add to those provisions, as the case may require."

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3. The effect of these enactments is that under ordinary circumstances animals brought from any foreign country must be slaughtered at the port of landing. the Privy Council (now the Board of Agriculture) on the one hand having power to prohibit the landing altogether from any specified foreign country, and on the other haud being under an obligation, where they are satisfied in the manner stated in Part IV. of the Fifth Schedule to the Act, that there is reasonable security against the introduction of disease from any particular country, to admit animals therefrom without being subject to slaughter.

It would seem from the wording of the Fifth Schedule that the Board of Agriculture have only power to admit animals free in those cases where they are obliged to do so, and that therefore they can only do so if and so long as they are satisfied that there is reasonable security.

4. By the Animals Order of 1886, a copy of which is enclosed, made by the Privy Council under the provisions of the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Acts, 1878 to 1886, it is provided by Clause 149 (1) that, unless and until the Privy Council otherwise order, animals brought from any of the countries comprised in Part I. of the Fifth Schedule to that Order, are allowed to be landed without being subject under the Fifth Schedule of the Act of 1878 or under that Order to slaughter or quarantine.

5. Part I. of the Fifth Schedule to that Order includes Her Majesty's possessions in North America.

6. In October 1892, three animals imported into Scotland from Canada were found to be affected with pleuro-pneumonia.

7. In consequence of this occurrence the Board of Agriculture are no longer satisfied, as required by the Act, that there is reasonable security against the importation of diseased animals from Canada, and the question therefore arises whether the Board are bound to revoke so much of the Animals Order of 1886, as authorises Canadian cattle to be landed without being subject to slaughter.

8. The Government of Canada, however, have urgently pressed that the Order allow- ing animals brought from Canada to the United Kingdom to be landed without being subject to slaughter may not be revoked; and they have undertaken if it is not revoked, to effectually prohibit the exportation of cattle from Canada to the United Kingdom this year.

The questions upon which the Law Officers of the Crown are asked to advise are as follows:-

1. If the Board of Agriculture cease to be satisfied that there is reasonable security as required by the Act against the importation of diseased animals from Canada, aro

70431.--32. 25.--12/92.

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