Please find below an e-mail to the SSPCA regarding their current policy of taking on what basically amounts to commercial contracts to handle stray dogs on behalf of Councils. We have released this in response to the appeal (see attachment) on behalf of a woman who cannot afford the £119 to get her dog back from the SSPCA. She’s lucky. Had she lost her dog in Glasgow it would have cost her £275 to get her dog back. She would have to pay the SSPCA a fee of up to £144.50 and then the Glasgow City Council would invoice her for the balance of the £275 which they have to pay to the SSPCA for every dog they handle. We can supply details of dog reclaim charges for all areas of Scotland.

 

If you would like a comment from John Robins of Animal Concern Advice Line (ACAL) use anything from:

 

John Robins states:

 

“I was shocked to learn that instead of keeping their promise to force local authorities to meet their duty of care to stray dogs the SSPCA has turned it into a lucrative money earner bringing in perhaps over £1 million a year. Every council tax payer in Scotland is subsidising this. Instead of doing the dirty work for Councils the SSPCA should get out of the lucrative stray dog business and take care of animals which no one helps.

 

At 2am on Sunday morning I received a phone call from someone who had taken a badly injured cat to the SSPCA Milton of Dumbarton Animal Welfare Centre only to find it closed and the SSPCA unavailable by telephone. Luckily I was able to advise and as a result the cat has been operated on, identified by its microchip and returned to its grateful owner. Instead of making money out of a 9 to 5 stray dog business the SSPCA should provide a proper 24/7 rescue service for injured wildlife and other animals which have no one else to care for them.

 

They can start by returning Shoeshine the Labrador to Coleen Watt who cannot afford the exorbitant ransom they want for his return. I’m also very worried that animals at unstaffed animal welfare centres could be at risk if pet owners feel forced to take the law into their own hands to get their pets back.”

 

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E-MAIL FROM: John F. Robins, Secretary, Animal Concern Advice Line (ACAL), c/o Animal Concern, P.O. Box 5178, Dumbarton G82 5YJ. Tel 01389-841111., Mobile: 07721-605521. Fax: 0870-7060327. Animal Concern Advice Line (ACAL) is a registered charity: No. SC030982. E-MAIL: acal@jfrobins.force9.co.uk Website: http://adviceaboutanimals.info

 

Stuart Earley Esquire,

Chief Executive,

Scottish SPCA,

Kingseat Road,

Halbeath,

Dunfermline KY11 8RY

 

Dear Mr. Earley,

 

I would be grateful if you would bring this communication to the attention of all the Scottish SPCA Trustees and Directors.

 

For the last three months Animal Concern Advice Line has been using the Freedom of Information Act to ascertain the policies and procedures of local authorities and the police throughout Scotland as regards meeting their legal requirement to deal with stray and abandoned dogs.

 

As you may be aware I have raised the issue of SSPCA involvement in dealing with stray dogs with several of your predecessors. I have argued that the SSPCA should concentrate on areas of animal welfare where no existing organisation has a legal duty of care. As around half of all stray dogs are reclaimed by their owners within a day or two of being taken off the streets it makes sense to leave local authorities, who have a stuatory duty to care for stray dogs, to deal with these animals thus freeing up the SSPCA’s charitable funds to care for animals which have no-one to look after them. The SSPCA had put itself in the ridiculous situation where it may have had to kill perfectly healthy dogs to make space for new animals brought in under local authority contracts, yet were likely to be reclaimed by their owners within a matter of hours. Over the years we received, in confidence, several reports from SSPCA staff and volunteers who were extremely concerned about this policy.

 

This situation came to a head in December 2005 when an SSPCA employee at Milton of Dumbarton Animal Welfare Centre openly admitted to the press that several dogs had indeed been put down to make room for new animals coming in.

 

Your announcement in 2008 that the SSPCA would, by mid 2009, withdraw from dealing with strays on behalf of Councils was most welcome. Your policy change to one of not killing healthy, rehomable animals was also much appreciated.

 

You can imagine my shock when the replies to my Freedom of Information requests came in and I discovered that, several months after you had pledged to withdraw from handling strays, the SSPCA still had contracts with at least eight local authorities. It was even more distressing to learn that your contracts make it very difficult for people to be re-united with their lost pets.

The SSPCA has created two big drawbacks to getting animals back to their owners. One is the extremely high fees you charge Councils and which are then reclaimed, at least in part, from pet owners. The second is the fact that you have taken on contracts to deal with strays in areas where you do not have any holding kennels. Many people, especially the elderly and those on low incomes, will find it very difficult to make the necessary repeated trips to distant animal welfare centres to check to see if their dog has been brought in. Once they have found their dogs many will be unable to raise the money, up to £275, to get their dogs back.

 

These two issues are in addition to the continued failure of the SSPCA to introduce a system where animals brought in to your centres can be linked to reports from owners of missing pets and by which owners can be contacted when a possible match for their pet is brought in.

According to information obtained from local authorities through the Freedom of Information Act we believe that as a result of SSPCA policy dog owners who lose their pets face financial and geographical difficulties in reclaiming their animals.

 

In Glasgow it now costs all dog owners a full £275.00 if their pet strays and spends as little as a few hours at your Cardonald Dog & Cat Home.

 

Owners in West Dunbartonshire have to pay up to £158.00 to reclaim their dogs from your Milton of Dumbarton centre.

 

Dog owners in Inverclyde have to pay up to £144.50 and travel from as far away as Greenock to Cardonald to be reunited with their pet.

 

Owners in South Lanarkshire have to travel to your Bothwell Bridge centre in Motherwell and pay up to £144.50 to reclaim their pet.

 

North Lanarkshire area dog owners also have to go to Bothwell Bridge and pay up to £127.06 to get their stray dog back.

 

East Renfrewshire dog owners have to pay up to £116.00 and go to Cardonald to pick up their stray dogs.

 

Dog owners in Kirkintilloch have to travel through to Milton of Dumbarton and part with as much as £94.50 to get their dog back.

 

I’m still waiting full details from Renfrewshire Council but as they tell me you charge them £275 per dog you take in from them at Cardonald I assume it will be similar to the others.

From the information received these contracts are extremely lucrative to the SSPCA with Glasgow City Council alone paying you in the region of £220,000 to £250,000 per year. You are charging more than most, if not all of the commercial and charitable bodies providing similar services to other local authorities. Owners reclaiming lost pets from SSPCA Centres are paying the highest fees in Scotland and travelling further than most to find their pets.

 

It will be another month or so before we fully process the information we have collected through the FoI Act. I had hoped to use our Report to try and persuade the SSPCA to fullfill your promise to withdraw from providing commercial stray dog handling services to Councils and to instead concentrate on the charitable objectives of providing for animals which have no one else to care for them.

 

However this has been superceded by events as this weekend I received an e-mail appeal which is basically looking for funds to “rescue” a dog from the SSPCA. The Greenock owner, Ms Coleen Watt (coleen.watt@yahoo.co.uk), had trouble locating her dog which was in your Cardonald Centre and she simply cannot afford to pay the ransom you want to charge her to get her dog back. (see http://ethicalvoiceforanimals.org.uk/shownotice.php?articleid=5)

 

I attach a copy of the appeal and ask you to urgently investigate the alleged circumstances and, if it is the case that your Cardonald staff failed to properly identify the dog and communicate with the owner, to return Shoeshine to her owner immediately.

 

I ask the Scottish SPCA to immediately reduce the fees you charge to owners for reclaiming their dogs. Even if you have to subsidise this by refunding part of the £250 to £275 flat fee you charge Councils for every dog, you are still likely to be in profit from provision of these services.

 

I ask the Scottish SPCA to get out of these contracts as soon as is possible and to use the resources supplied by your supporters to care for animals for which no-one has a duty of care. Instead of doing the dirty work for local authorities why not join us in campaigning for legislation such as pet registration and microchipping, to greatly increase the welfare of all domestic pets?

 

I look forward to hearing the response of the Directors and Trustees of the Scottish SPCA in due course.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

John F. Robins,

Animal Concern Advice Line