Sunday, 10 June 2012

Time for a Dangerous Dog "Owners" Act

A spate of bad headlines about dangerous dogs and dangerous owners has exposed the need for a new law regarding the ownership of potentially dangerous dogs. The present law is no longer fit for purpose. To be precise, the new act should be called the Dangerous Dog Owners Act, reflecting the idiocy of many dog owners in Britain.

This week alone there have been reports of at least two dog attacks on children, one just two years old. Both were seriously injured by Staffordshire Bull Terrier dogs, the current choice of breed. Closely related to these occurrences is an emerging trend of cruelty to these dogs.

Two Staffordshire Bull Terriers were recently murdered by those owners they thought they could trust. In the first dog-murdering incident, the individual drowned his dog because he could no longer afford to keep the dog. He chose the cruel option, rather than one of the many alternatives. The dog was called Tyson.

In the other incident, the individual murdered his dog, also called Tyson, because the dog urinated on his bed.

A revised Act of Parliament reflecting these post-millennium attitudes is desperately needed. The Dangerous Dogs Act often punishes dogs rather than the owners. Within any new act, an effective licensing system is needed, which prohibits those with criminal records from being allowed to keep dogs. The system should also prohibit those with records of cruelty to pets or failure to control pets from keeping dogs.

Licences should not be mere formality, where a prospective dog owner simply has to fill out a form and pay a nominal sum. They should be a means of monitoring how dogs are cared for, and the lack of any such licence should result in a financial penalty and confiscation of the pet.

It is sad that it has come to a point where a string of reports of dog attacks (perpetrated by and towards dogs) is no longer seen as a moral panic, but an unfortunate backdrop to modern British life. The sooner a Dangerous Dog Owners Act is passed into law, the better.