In this article I address two examples of difficulties in enforcing animal laws; one from the United States and the other from the United Kingdom. Having read the stories I was struck by the commonality of the problem: how to enforce well-intentioned and good animal laws which either protect the animals or people or both.
There are other examples in different countries which may not have come to light because the animal law remained a proposal and no more because the legislators decided that it was impractical to enforce it.
Indianapolis, USA
Currently, in Indianapolis, if you want to buy a purebred puppy from a pet store you have to go out of town. That’s because the local law is that pet stores cannot stock commercially bred dogs and I presume cats. The same law applies to the cities of Carmel and West Lafayette.
The idea is very laudable namely that if people want to adopt a dog or cat, they should go to a rescue center or a ‘proper’ breeder. Pet stores often go to what might be argued are unscrupulous breeders churning out puppies and kittens in puppy mills. The administrators of the cities wants to get rid of this problem to protect animals.
But the state legislature of Indiana have intervened and are currently debating Bill HB1412 which would modify these local laws to allow pet stores around the state to sell puppies starting in 2025 as long as the animals come from certified breeders. The pet stores selling puppies would have to provide information about the puppies to customers and comply with other policies.
If HB1412 becomes law, “ordinances banning their retail sale will be unenforceable and milled puppies will return to the cities.”
Although this proposed legislation says that the breeder needs to be reputable i.e. certified, “few believe the state will be able to enforce such a vague provision”. The words are those of Nathan Winograd, a very powerful animal advocate in America and lawyer.
And here we have the problem of enforceability. Winograd adds that “one of those opposing legislation is the very agency tasked in the bill with enforcing it: they say that they can’t and won’t because they do not have the staff or the funding.”
And there we have an underlying problem. Once you make laws through parliament or a state legislature, you have to have the means to enforce it. This means the staff – perhaps the police force or other agencies – to enforce the law combined with the willingness to do it.
RELATED: Enforcement of laws for compulsory desexing the stumbling block
United Kingdom
In the UK, there’s a new ban on XL bully dogs, which has been well discussed in the news media. It came into force on the first day of this month and was created by adding the XL bully ‘breed’ to the existing list of the Dangerous Dogs Act.
Over the weekend, a grandmother of 68 was mauled to death by two suspected XL bully dogs while visiting her grandson in Essex who I believe is a breeder of these dogs and you had puppies in his house.
The puppies were fighting and she intervened with a broom as instructed by her grandson. The two XL bully dogs appeared to have objected to that and attacked and killed her.
The question is why did these XL bully dogs exist? In the UK there should be no XL bully dogs because of the ban and if they are in existence, they should be licensed under a registration scheme and when in public they should be on a lead and muzzled. In addition, they should be micro-chipped and neutered. Breeding XL bullies is against the law.
But there appears to be an enforcement problem because it is believed that there are 15,000 unregistered XL bully dogs still illegally on the streets. The police can seize unregistered dogs and owners can face a criminal record and an unlimited fine. However, the police either don’t have the manpower or the willingness to properly enforce this law.
The enforcement of this law is dependent on neighbours acting as spies on behalf of the government to report the presence of an XL bully dog to the authorities. A lot of neighbours won’t do that and I suspect there will be thousands of XL bully dogs in the UK many years after the law was enacted.
Australia
This is a postscript to the above. In Australia they want to create laws which restrict cat ownership in order to protect wildlife particularly small mammals and marsupials. But I’m sure that the legislators have discussed the problems of enforcement. This has probably put them off creating laws. For example, obligatory sterilisation of animals is a good idea but if the cats are confined to a home how you know they exist? How do you enforce it? Just one example.
RELATED: What does a legally enforceable Bill of Rights for dogs and cats mean in California?
Singapore
There is an article on the Internet about the challenges in the enforcement of animal protection laws in Singapore. This is a nice example of what I’m talking about. The author says that there are some very good animal welfare and protection laws in Singapore “however, these laws are only powerful to the extent that they are actually enforced. In Singapore, the low number of prosecutions for animal cruelty is a cause for serious concern.”
There are obviously many reasons for this but the author says that “one primary cause is the insufficient understanding of what amounts or may amount of cruelty at law”.
This leads to poor enforcement.
England
There’s been a lot of discussion about the inadequate funding of British police which undermines the enforcement of all laws in the country including animal welfare and protection laws.
And in England there is a lack of consistency across the country. This is called a postcode lottery as to whether animal protection laws are enforced where you live or not. For example, 47% of councils in England have known dedicated animal welfare officers. Where there is an animal welfare officer it is unclear whether they enforce the law across all animals or focus on farm animals or dogs only for instance.
For my part, I would argue that a great problem enforcement of animal protection laws is the lack of commitment that the police show in this area of their work. The police tend to prioritise their work and animals are not high on their priority list. In short, they are second class citizens.
Generally
It’s quite easy for a country to present to the world that they are concerned about animal welfare by creating nice-looking animal welfare law. But if you scratch the surface you will see that in many countries there is almost no proper enforcement of these laws resulting in far too much animal abuse in the world.
International treaties
Many countries have signed up to a treaty which states that they should do their best to stop the trade in wildlife and wild animal body parts. But this trade takes place almost unabated because of a lack of commitment to carrying out their obligations under this treaty. That’s another example. The trade in wildlife is worth billions annually. It should be zero. An utter failure in wildlife protection. The treaty am talking about is the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
