First, the litany of recent cases:
The child was yet another innocent victim in a terrifying glut of killings and maulings by dogs in this country.Note the breeds.
In February, a three-month-old boy, Jayden Joseph Mack, was killed by the family pet, a Staffordshire bull terrier, at his grandmother's home in Ystrad Mynach, South Wales.
A month later, three-year-old Demi Franklyn was attacked by a neighbour's Japanese Akita fighting hound as she played outside her own front door in Shipley, Yorkshire.
The creature, called Tyson, suddenly turned on Demi, breaking her jaw and leaving the little girl with horrific head wounds. Doctors said her injuries were so bad she may never smile again.
But these aren't the only recent attacks. Ellie Lawrenson, aged five, of Liverpool, died after being bitten 72 times by a pit bull terrier, while one-year-old Archie-Lee Hirst, from Wakefield, and Cadey-Lee Deacon, aged five months, of Leicester, were each savaged to death by rottweilers.
All but one were not breeds specifically named in the DDA. And you can add to that the two GSDs that killed a young man of 21, in the news today.
So why this should come as a surprise to her, I can’t say:
So, 18 years after the introduction of the Dangerous Dogs' Act which was meant to end such atrocities, how have these bloodthirsty creatures become such a nightmarish part of modern Britain?Because the DDA was appallingly poorly drawn up legislation that concentrated on four breeds deemed ‘dangerous’, despite the fact that:
All dogs over a certain size are potentially ‘dangerous’, and
Three of the named breeds were probably less likely to be seen in the UK than the Surrey Panther.
While pit bulls were banned by the 1991 Dangerous Dogs Act, in practice they have far from disappeared. And, in any case, Staffordshire bull terriers, bull mastiffs, Rottweilers and other equally intimidating breeds can be bought with ease, as I shall explain later.Well, quite.
So, a little pointless arguing that the DDA should have had an effect when even a ‘Daily Fail’ journalist can see the flaws in it.
But it's when we look at the Tory-controlled councils and their methods of dealing with the problem that we see why the Tories aren't worth anyone's vote:
Leading the fightback is the London borough of Wandsworth, which has become the first council to introduce compulsory dog micro-chipping on its council estates.Wow, and I always thought it was poor socialisation and bad treatment that created a potentially dangerous dog! Who knew it was the mere presence of a council rent book?
Those who don't register for the scheme are potentially in breach of their tenancy conditions and could lose their property.
And of course, cruel, dog-fight-loving scum never own their own houses, do they?
That’ll come as news to animal experts and chav-watchers alike…
In a further crackdown, the Conservative-run Wandsworth has vowed to evict any council tenant who fails to keep their dog under control. It is also liaising with other local authorities to lobby the Government to reintroduce a compulsory licence system for dog owners.Genius! What could go wrong?
Unlike the old licence (which cost £10 from the Post Office and was abandoned in 1987), it would have very real 'teeth'. Ideally, Wandsworth would like the cost of the licence to be £500, and the minimum age for dog ownership to be 20.
Sorry, Aunt Gladys, you’ll have to decide between heating your home this winter or keeping your elderly, arthritic Peke.
Sorry, Uncle John, it’s the twelve-year-old rescue Labrador you got to keep your two kids company and give a home to, or your car; which can you afford to keep?
Sorry, Dogs Protection League/Battersea Dogs Home, better put all those strays down now; the only people that can afford them probably won’t want them in anything like the right numbers.
It looks like Kit Malthouse isn’t the only Tory cretin with no clue when it comes to dogs:
'The problem is that just about anyone can own a dog,' council leader Edward Lister explained. 'That's got to change. Most of the problems we have today are caused by young people who keep these menacing dogs. The case for restoring the dog licence is overwhelming.'Oh, well done, Edward!
That's ensuring that the votes of all the animal lovers aren't going to go to a party represented by a cretin who wants to price dog ownership out of the average family.
God forbid any political party should try to target the ones actually causing the trouble, when it's so much easier to slap a blanket policy over everything and sit back as it is administered by the sort of cretins who caused this nightmare situation for one owner...
I think what we need is a Dangerous Politician Act.
8 comments:
This is the latest in a long line of crappy initiatives which punish the innocent (usually egged on by fake charities like Alcohol Concern) and fail to get at the guilty. As another example of legislative incompetence (by a Conservative administration) you could have cited the anti-gun legislation post-Dunblane as a conspicuous failure. Failure, of course, unless the real objective of the legislation was to get firearms out of the hands of responsible gun owners and give an effective monopoly on non-state gun-holding to the crims. BTW, in the same way that a major responsibility for the banking crisis can be laid on the regulators, so a major responsibility for the Dunblane massacre can be laid at the door of the regulator (the local police).
This kind of crap has a long history of which drug legislation is another outstanding example.
Quite.
As we know, all problems can be solved by more regulations and higher taxes.
The dog license was never got rid of in Northern Ireland. We still have it, and it costs £5 from the Town Hall. Or it did, at least. Our politicians are as bloody stupid as yours, and are currently trying to increase it from £5 to £50. If you've got two or three dogs, that's a nightmare. Oh, and they're also going for a total ban on ever letting any dog off its lead outside the house.
They're pulling the usual trick of announcing insane measures and then backtracking a bit, so we're supposed to feel all warm inside when the license fee goes up to £20 — a 300% tax increase — 'cause at least it's not the originally proposed 900% increase.
Needless to say, the politician chiefly responsible for this lives on a farm so can walk her dogs for miles in her back garden. I'd love to say that the fact she's in Sinn Fein is hardly surprising, given their fondness for fascism, but all the other parties seem equally fond of it these days.
Oh, they're also proposing compulsory chipping (at the owner's expense), which is something I do support, as it establishes the chain of responsibility between the dog and the owner in a way that is difficult to deny. Thing is, the only point of the licensing scheme is to keep track of who owns which dog. So, if all the dogs are chipped, what the hell's the license for, and why should its price go up?
We need a Dangerous Chav Act, not a Dangerous Dog Act.
Long time since I dealt with it but I believe that the 'dog dangerously out of control' part of the dangerous dogs act only applies in a public place (outside in the street)or in a private place where the dog has no permission to be (neighbour's garden).Not in the owner's house.
The banned breeds part of the act applies anywhere but in the past there has been a lot of legal argument about whether a particular dog actually is a pitbull, rather than a staff. bull terrier.I understand that pit bull terriers do not exist as a breed.
At last! Someone addressing the "pet" dog problem - I regard keeping dogs in cities as cruelty to the animal and to the long-suffering non-owners around it.If it takes a 500 quid license to reduce the dog-crap tonnage significantly,it's a bargain!
"As another example of legislative incompetence (by a Conservative administration) you could have cited the anti-gun legislation..."
Yup, another one that did a bang-up job (pun intended)...
"Our politicians are as bloody stupid as yours, and are currently trying to increase it from £5 to £50. "
Which will backfire on them at the polling booth, one hopes...
"Oh, they're also proposing compulsory chipping (at the owner's expense), which is something I do support.."
Yes, that would certainly get my vote. It isn't totally foolproof, though, as the chip can 'walk'...
"Long time since I dealt with it but I believe that the 'dog dangerously out of control' part of the dangerous dogs act only applies in a public place (outside in the street)or in a private place where the dog has no permission to be (neighbour's garden).Not in the owner's house."
It does indeed. Which is why several cases have resulted in the animal in question not being put down by the owner, as there was no legal compulsion to do so.
"At last! Someone addressing the "pet" dog problem - I regard keeping dogs in cities as cruelty to the animal and to the long-suffering non-owners around it.If it takes a 500 quid license to reduce the dog-crap tonnage significantly,it's a bargain!"
Anything else you don't specifically care for and would like to impose on anyone else's freedom to do so? Prefer cornflakes for breakfast, and want to outlaw fry ups?
And when do you run for office?
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