The Humane League UK, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

Paragraph 29 of Schedule 1 to the Welfare of Farmed Animals (England) Regulations 2007 requires the reasonable person responsible for an animal to expect that, given its genotype or phenotype, it can be kept in appropriate conditions without obvious or deleterious effects on health or welfare.

The provision is directed to the choice of breed and the conditions in which it is kept. It does not create a conditional permission requiring a keeper to prove compliance in criminal proceedings. A public authority may rely on expert scientific advice and need not resolve contested scientific evidence conclusively. A code of practice need not address every issue arising in animal husbandry. Challenges to technical monitoring arrangements and alleged unequal enforcement face the high threshold of irrationality.

The claimant, an animal welfare charity, sought judicial review of the Secretary of State’s policies concerning fast-growing broiler chickens. It challenged the interpretation and application of paragraph 29 of Schedule 1 to the Welfare of Farmed Animals (England) Regulations 2007, the Welfare of Meat Chickens and Meat Breeding Chickens Code of Practice, the trigger system for identifying poor welfare conditions, the Secretary of State’s investigation of the evidence, and alleged unequal treatment between compliant and non-compliant producers.

Permission was initially refused but was granted on appeal by Singh LJ in September 2022. The claim was heard at first instance by the Administrative Court. The central issues were the meaning of paragraph 29 and whether the Secretary of State’s policies, monitoring arrangements and enforcement approach were unlawful in public law terms.

1. Claim dismissed. The court declined to grant a declaration on the meaning of paragraph 29 in the abstract because the issue arose within a field requiring expert scientific judgment and there was no sufficiently clear factual matrix. It nevertheless construed the provision as necessary to determine the substantive grounds.
2. Paragraph 29 must be read in its statutory context, including the potential criminal liability arising under regulations 4 and 7. It does not impose a conditional permission under which keepers must establish in criminal proceedings that animals can be kept without detrimental effects.
3. The relevant standard is objective and is that of the reasonable person responsible for the animals. The harm must be reasonably attributable to the animal’s genotype or phenotype. “Any detrimental effect” means obvious or deleterious harm, rather than every minor adverse effect. “Kept for farming purposes” does not mean kept in one particular farming system; the obligation is to keep the chosen breed in appropriate conditions without such harm.
4. The Secretary of State’s statutory powers under sections 12 and 14 of the Animal Welfare Act 2006 were broad. The Code of Practice provided practical guidance and did not specifically authorise the keeping of fast-growing breeds, purport to interpret paragraph 29, or rely on a contrary interpretation. There was therefore no unlawful policy or material omission.
5. The Secretary of State had considered the scientific literature and obtained expert advice, including from APHA. Her conclusion that environmental conditions could affect the welfare of both fast- and slow-growing breeds was not irrational and did not demonstrate a failure to take relevant matters into account. The Tameside challenge therefore failed.
6. Paragraph 15(2) of Schedule 5A did not prescribe the numerical thresholds for reporting or further action. The Secretary of State was entitled to select trigger levels as a matter of technical judgment. The criticisms of the trigger system did not meet the high threshold for irrationality.
7. The alleged unequal treatment claim also failed. Even assuming that the retained 2007 Regulations attracted the principle of equal treatment, inconsistency would be reviewable only where irrational distinctions were shown. The claimant established neither that precondition nor irrationality in enforcement.

Permission to bring the judicial review was refused on the papers and on a renewed oral application. Court of Appeal Singh LJ granted permission in September 2022 because the claim raised matters of public interest, while recognising that it might fail on the merits. The present court then dismissed the substantive claim.