The Association of British Reindeer Herders would like to announce that in collaboration with the NFU it has been agreed that deer (INCLUDING REINDEER) are going to be exempted from Zoo Licensing regulations going forward.
Our licence for keeping or training animals for exhibition will be sufficient to take our reindeer out and about, as well as now allowing them to be displayed on home sites for over 6 days together with long term bookings at client sites.
This issue has been ongoing since mid 2024. We have been working very hard to ensure that our livelihoods can be maintained and through powerful lobbying from some of our own MPs (namely Sarah Dyke who raised our issue in Parliament) together with the NFU’s Livestock Policy Team, we have now reached the point where Local Authority Licensing/DEFRA and Government have all reached the conclusion that the Zoo Licensing regulations are not necessary for Reindeer.
There will be a period where wording etc is agreed, but the advice given to us is that you firstly contact your own Licensing Officer to explain that you are aware of these amendments and that you would like them to respond.
The Livestock Policy Team at the NFU have agreed that you can give any Licensing Officer their contact details so that any queries they may have can be collated and then sent on to the main Head of Licensing for England who will then respond to them directly with the details of the update. It means that there is a working framework in place to allow us to get on with running our businesses.
There will of course be issues along the way – some of you may well be in the process of obtaining your Zoo License for example, and we don’t know how individual cases such as this will be handled but in the first instance you will need to contact your own Licensing team.
