Caretaker agriculture minister Femke Wiersma (BBB) will be facing MPs’ questions over persistently putting off a ban on the use of electric cattle prods in animal transports despite an earlier promise by her predecessor Piet Adema to ban the practice by July 1 last year.

A  majority of MPs have supported a ban since 2022, following undercover footage made by animal rights organisation Wakker Dier showing random prodding of pigs on their heads and mouths to load them into the trucks.

This is against EU rules which only allow electric prods to be used on the animals’ hind quarters. The ban would only cover animal transports in the Netherlands.

Produce safety watchdog NVWA, which is supposed to supervise transports, has said it lacks the manpower to check for abuse during transports.

Wiersma tried to reverse Adema’s decision in November last year.  Faced with protests from MPs, Wiersma claimed she needed advice from the Council of State and permission from the European Commission, which she said would take at least three months.

She then delayed both procedures for unknown reasons and the date was then moved to January 1, 2026.

Despite the council’s positive response and Brussels’ agreement, Wiersma has not signed off on the measure or published it in the Staatscourant, putting in doubt the current date as well.

The request on Tuesday for a debate with the minister by animal rights party PvdD has the backing of a majority of MPs.

“We have to chase minister Wiersma to get her to introduce the ban but nothing happens. She is showing little respect for MPs,” PvdD MP Esther Ouwehand told the Volkskrant. D66 MP Anne Marijke Podt said she “had no idea what the minister is waiting for”.

Asked when the ban would start on January 1 on morning show Goedemorgen Nederland, Wiersma said January 1 was still the “starting point”. No date has been set for the debate.