Dr Michael Morris - Animal welfare writer Dr Michael Morris has a PhD in zoology from the University of Auckland. He is presently teaching degree courses in environmental management at the Bay of Plenty Polytechnic.

In a previous posting (January 5) I gave a cautious commendation to Simon Bridges for a useful first step in clamping down on animal abuse. It is pleasing to note that Simon's Private Members Bill has now been adopted by the government, and the Minister of Agriculture has expressed interest in expanding the Bill to include other parts of the Animal Welfare Act that need to be improved.

One improvement I could suggest would be to require that the supposedly independent and ministerially appointed National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee (NAWAC), be required to properly take into account public sensibilities regarding animal welfare. The act does require NAWAC to 'have regard to” public opinion, but the head of NAWAC told me that this does not mean 'accept”.

NAWAC have consistently ignored public appeals for a ban on battery hen cages and severe confinement of sows, but often spend disproportionate time listening to industry appointed scientists. Their official guidelines paint a picture of a public that are misinformed and fickle. In this they are showing a scientific elitism that dismisses the common sense observations of the public as somehow 'unscientific”. One NAWAC member even compared the sensibilities of the public as akin to medieval zealots opposing Galileo.

This attitude is part of a wider belief that common sense science must be suspect because it has sometimes been proved to be wrong. The common sense beliefs that the sun goes around the Earth or the beliefs of classical physics are often cited as case studies.

However, unlike quantum physics or astronomy, which requires specialised study to master, reading the emotions and feelings of other sentient beings is part of general emotional intelligence, and a necessary evolutionary adaptation in a social species such as Homo sapiens. Common sense notions of animal welfare also show a strong agreement with 'scientific” findings using recognised methodologies. Certainly common sense views about the inhumane nature of sow stalls, farrowing crates and battery cages have been backed up by recognised scientific bodies.

A useful law change that the government could consider would therefore be to require not only that NAWAC 'have regard” to public values, but that they 'recognise and provide for” them. This simple change in wording would make it far harder for industry approved scientists to simply dismiss public concerns in the way they have done so far.