Members of Swindon Borough Council’s licensing committee heard from the licensing manager Jason Kirkwood that the rules around licensing the keeping of primates had been changed by the government.
Primates are a large and diverse order of mammals that includes monkeys, lemurs, apes and even human beings.
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The sort of species that might be expected to be licenced to be kept as pets include Marmosets, Tamarins, Squirrel Monkeys, Spider Monkeys, Capuchin Monkeys, Lemurs, and Lorisids which are also known as bush babies.
Mr Kirkwood said: “Existing and prospective keepers of primates will be required to be licensed by the local authority. Only a person, and not an organisation, can keep a primate under this primate licence.
“We are responsible for administering and enforcing this licensing regime and must make sure that individuals who apply for a licence are likely to meet the licence conditions, licences are not granted to individuals that are disqualified from keeping primates, and that we take appropriate enforcement action against those individuals who do not have a licence when they should and monitor compliance with the licence conditions themselves.”
The conditions under which a primate must be kept are the same as for keeping any other animal under the Animal Welfare Act of 2006.
The animal must be kept in a suitable environment, receive a suitable diet, be able to exhibit normal behaviour patterns, be housed with, or apart from, other animals, and be protected from pain, suffering, injury, and disease.
Mr Kirkwood said there are now two trained licensing officers who know the sort of conditions and diets that the sort of primates likely to be kept as pets need – and they will make a visit to the premises to assess whether it meets the licence conditions.
Asked by Councillor Lawrence Elliott how often a visit would be made in the three-year duration of a three-year licence, Mr Kirkwood said: “We would make a visit before a licence is granted or renewed and there would be one further visit within that three-year period of the licence.”
Councillor Dan Adams said he was concerned that applications for such a licence could make the applicant a target for animal rights activists. He said: “If addresses are on the licence application, some might take exception and go to the house to try and free the animal.
“I wouldn’t want our licensing practice to make people more of a target.”
The committee chairman Councillor John Ballman said: “The animal rights activists are entitled to their opinion. But we must enforce and enact the legislation.”
In answer to a question from Cllr Elliott, Mt Kirkwood said there had been no applications for a licence to keep primates in Swindon under the new regime.