Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Update on dog attack law to be welcomed
New legislation going through Parliament will allow the authorities to come down harder on the owners of dogs which attack livestock. About time we got tough, Bridgwater and West Somerset MP Ian LiddellGrainger tells Defra Secretary Steve Barclay.
DEAR Steve, There are few pieces of legislation I can support more enthusiastically than the current proposed updating of the Dogs (Protection of Livestock) Act: a 70-yearold measure which is now woefully inadequate for the purpose for which it was created; namely giving farmers some protection against sheep attacks.
I suspect a few of my urban colleagues will still raise an eyebrow when we insist that there is a need to strengthen its provisions and crank up the available sanctions. But did they live, like I do, in a constituency across a broad sweep of which there are far more sheep than people, they would get some measure of the problems farmers face.
I had to laugh somewhat hollowly when I read recently the pious outpouring from some research group or other informing me that the Great British Public are becoming more supportive of the British farming community and would like to be able to buy and consume much more of what it produces. Because there is, equally, a section of the populace – and apparently a growing one – which clearly cares not a whit about farmers and regards them merely as custodians of a canine playground where dogs can urinate, defecate and chase animals to their hearts’ content.
We are, I am afraid, suffering from a very unfavourable alignment of the planets. The right to roam legislation not only declared more of the countryside open for access but sent a clear message that the public should get out and enjoy it – without the government of the day offering the merest additional caveat or caution as to how they should behave when they got there.
Then the pandemic saw a surge in dog ownership, many such animals, sadly, falling into the hands of those with neither the time nor domestic space nor, indeed, knowledge to care for them properly. Many of these are the very pets which are simply being let off the lead as soon as they leave the Tarmac – and to hell with the consequences. The NFU Mutual figures speak for themselves: a 50 per cent rise in the cost of dog attacks on livestock between 2019 and 2022 – a financial burden which, of course, has to be shared by all farmers who insure with the agency through their increased premiums.
As if seeing your ewes miscarry or lambs torn to shreds wasn’t enough grief for a farmer to bear, the increasingly hostile attitude of some feral owners is piling on even more pressure.
Last year the National Sheep Association reported that 70 per cent of farmers were subject to verbal abuse, intimidation, being ignored, or negative attitudes from the dog owners they approached asking for their pets to be put on a lead. Typical of the response was one reported to me where a farmer was shouted and sworn at and told if his sheep were being chased by a dog then it was his fault for leaving them loose in a field – and why didn’t he just lock them up in a barn.
All, I am afraid, a hallmark of the general disrespect for the countryside of which the huge increase in dog fouling on footpaths is another measure.
With more than 70 per cent of sheep farmers now reporting attacks, the moment could hardly be more appropriate for bringing in penalties to fit the crime. The prospect of much higher fines could well see many irresponsible owners think twice before letting their pets run loose, as would the provision for increasing police powers to follow up and investigate any attack.
The police, of course, cannot act effectively without evidence which is why I would urge anyone, farmer or otherwise, witnessing any form of attack on any species of farm animal to collect and pass on whatever information they can in order that we can really get on top of this issue and start to lessen the burden of misery it creates for those who produce our food.