Charity had over 4200 animal welfare cases

Lockdown put an immense pressure on resources

The Scottish SPCA attended over 4200 animal welfare jobs in Lanarkshire during the first six months of 2020.

Charity chiefs revealed they were called out to South Lanarkshire 2134 times and another 2077 in neighbouring North Lanarkshire – a total of 4211 across the region.

With lockdown forcing the closure of all nine Scottish SPCA animal rescue and rehoming centres across Scotland, including the base on Hamilton’s Bothwell Road, animals were arriving without being rehomed. This put immense pressure on teams and resources.

However, as restrictions eased, the charity introduced virtual rehoming to get animals in to loving homes.

This has successfully led to the Scottish SPCA in Lanarkshire rehoming 275 animals in the first six months of the year.

They also returned 77 animals to their rightful owner.

The charity had engaged with 48,798 school children through its free educational programme until it was put on hold in mid-march due to the coronavirus pandemic. Cancelled bookings since then meant education officers were unable to meet over 40,000 primary and secondary school pupils.

However, the SPCA provided free educational resources online to support home- learning, and these have been downloaded over 6000 times by parents, carers and teachers. And 1000 printed learning packs were also developed and, with the help of Police Scotland, distributed to children who may struggle to access online tools.

Scottish SPCA chief executive Kirsteen Campbell said: “Our whole team has worked so hard through this unprecedented crisis, and the passion and dedication they have displayed all the way through has been truly inspirational.

“Even during lockdown, we were still averaging a call about an animal in need every 90 seconds, which shows the scale of demand there was for our services.

“As Scotland’s animal champions, we have a duty to continue to do our job under any circumstances to make sure pets, wildlife, farm animals and people get the help they need.

“Thank you so much to our partners and the public for such great support.”