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| Ⓒjohnbrookland/ARW |
Ask
most people who they first think of to report animal cruelty and you can almost
guarantee they will answer RSPCA or SSPCA. Ask them who they think is legally
responsible for investigating and prosecuting animal abuse and you will
probably get the same answer. But
this is not the case as they have only become the default agency because those
who should be responsible are unable or unwilling to cope.
Many people do not
realise that there are other authorities who should be doing the job including including the police, local
authorities and DEFRA, who are often happy to decry the RSPCA but have little interest themselves, as it is
an expensive and specialist area of law enforcement.
When the government introduced the all-encompassing new Animal Welfare Act 2006 they failed to appoint anyone to enforce it.
There is also a
misplaced conviction that the Society has mythical powers of arrest, forced
entry and seizure when the sad truth is that they have no powers at all. Their
is little appetite amongst the other authorities who get involved such as the
Police and local authorities as they feel they do not have a statutory duty to
bother. With no one else apparently capable of doing the job it is lucky the
RSPCA has stepped into the breach. But not everyone sees it that way and police
authorities, judges, the media and legal profession regularly condemn
the RSPCA and state that there is a conflict of interest and they have muscled their way into becoming the default agency.
Ironically there
would be little or no investigation or prevention of animal cruelty without
their input as they prosecute over 90% of cases taken under the Animal Welfare
Act, 2006 and they are the only organisation that collects statistics on
cruelty, so without them we would not even know the level of animal abuse in
the country. Basically the Police, our local authorities and the Department
for the Environment, Farming and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) should be playing a
bigger role. Recently there has been a lot of hand
wringing at suggestions of giving legal powers to the RSPCA even though most other
countries have gone down this route successfully.
The National Police Chiefs
Authority have stated that: ‘Under
the Animal Welfare Act 2006 there is no one agency that is held responsible or
accountable for enforcement of animal welfare. This means there are
inconsistencies, however the Police, local authorities and animal welfare
charities do seek to work together to deal with serious cruelty to animals.’
So what is the
real situation and who should you contact.
Reporting animal cruelty to to
the Police.
If you call a
Police call centre they will usually automatically refer you to the RSPCA, but
you should insist they attend if it is an emergency situation. The National
Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) stated they are happy to: ‘signpost reports of animal
welfare to the RSPCA and only provide a police response in emergency cases’.
In all fairness
the Police are overstretched and in reality are out of their depth or
comfort zone when it comes to animal cruelty issues. Many officers no doubt
have the attitude that they have better things to do. They also admit that
their front-line officers rarely use or even know about the Act and many forces
rely on a few ‘specialist’ dog and wildlife crime officers to deal with
animals.
Reporting Animal
Cruelty to DEFRA.
You can report
many aspects of cruelty to the local Department for the Environment, Farming
and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) who are tasked with most aspects of the care,
welfare and transport of livestock, slaughterhouses and animals in general, but
the number of inspectors and inspections is woefully inadequate.
In 2016 they only managed to visit 1,676 farms out of 362,151 that were due inspection for animal welfare – just
0.46%. The potential
for missed cases of suffering is huge.
Reporting animal cruelty to
local authorities.
Local government
authorities, usually the environmental health department inspectors, are
responsible for licensing animal premises and welfare in dog breeding, pet
shops, riding stables and most places where animal are kept. Like the Police
they have no statutory duty to enforce the Animal Welfare Act.
But the Animal
Welfare Act has discretionary powers for national and local authorities to
appoint ‘inspectors’, but because of the cost and training required only 60%
did so when the law was introduced, with many withdrawing them over the last
decade due to the costs involved, and of these only 17% had inspectors dealing
with companion animals.
Other Animal Charities.
Straying into
areas involving campaigning against and prosecuting animal cruelty is
contentious as well as expensive and risks alienating donors so most animal
charities steer well clear and prefer instead to concentrate on the aftermath
of irresponsible ownership and ill-treatment of animals.
Different in
Scotland
Scotland
approaches the subject differently and the Scottish SPCA (SSPCA) is designated
a ‘Specialist Reporting Agency’, who report the facts of a
case of cruelty to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. And it is
they who decide whether the evidence warrants a prosecution and is in the
‘public interest’. In this way it protects the SSPCA from any criticism or
blame of victimisation or conflict of interest.
Many believe this
is the way forward and ensures an independent and unbiased approach, but in
reality, with all authorities already giving cruelty a low priority because of
funding restraints and staffing, and having a differing viewpoint from those
who deal with cruelty daily, it would undoubtedly result in very few
prosecutions being taken or deterrent to those who harm animals.
The easy solution
would be to give the RSPCA more powers, the road many other countries such as
Australia, New Zealand and the USA have gone down, but in our land of animal
lovers we don’t seem to be able to get our head round the idea.
