Emaciated stray dogs left at night
A DOG lover is angry that neither Cornwall Council nor the RSPCA could help two stray dogs he came across late at night.
Chris Vaughan, of Porthtowan, had taken his dogs out at 10.30pm on July 29, when two emaciated and sore ridden short-haired German pointers came out of the darkness.
He said: "Not wanting my own dogs to pick anything up from the dogs, who were scratching and mouthing at sores, I returned home, with the 'stray' dogs, whose ribs and spines looked as though they were about to be exposed, following us."
Mr Vaughan left the dogs in his yard while he began trying to organise care for them.
He first contacted the RSPCA and said: "Once I had fathomed the choices menu on their 24/7 service line, the recorded message told me that I should contact the local authority.
"I rang Cornwall Council and was told there was no dog warden available."
Mr Vaughan then spoke with the area's RSPCA officer who he said advised him the dogs would be okay until they could be picked up in the morning from his back yard.
Mr Vaughan added: "I explained that one of them required, in my opinion, veterinary assistance.
"I was very unimpressed by the care shown by the RSPCA, and Cornwall Council to provide a 24/7 dog warden service as it has been charged to do so by government policy."
Following a change in the law last year, when stray dogs could be dealt with by police out of hours, local councils are now responsible for stray dogs at all times. RSPCA spokeswoman Jude Clay said: "Local authorities have sole responsibility for dealing with stray dogs no matter what time of day but when the law was changed we did express concerns about this."
Confirmed
The RSPCA confirmed that if it takes on responsibility for a stray dog, it is viewed under the law in the same way as any member of the public and it must hand over the dog to the statutory agencies.
Ms Clay added: "This is why people who find a stray dog and call the RSPCA are redirected to the local authority.
"In this particular case, we received a call in the morning from the member of the public who advised us that one of the dogs required veterinary treatment and they were collected by the RSPCA the same day."
The dogs were taken to a vet and then on to the RSPCA centre at St Columb, where they are being cared for.
A spokesman for Cornwall Council said: "Following the concerns expressed by Mr Vaughan, we have checked all our phone records for that evening but cannot find details of this call relating to stray dogs at Porthtowan Beach.
"Although the introduction of the Environmental Protection Act in 2008 imposed a duty on local councils to provide an out of hours service for stray dogs, they are not required to provide a round-the-clock call-out service. Government guidance states that councils should instead provide a place to which dogs can be taken outside normal office hours."
He said callers were asked if they could secure the dog until a warden could collect it, or told of a safe place where they could leave it.
Comments
by Chris Vaughan, Porthtowan
Thursday, August 20 2009, 2:54PM
“Having read the report regarding two stray dogs finding me when out walking my dogs towards the rear gate of R.A.F. Portreath, I write to offer a few corrections. I first telephoned the R.S.P.C.A. at around 10.50 p.m. in the evening and finally the Inspector, who phoned me back at gone midnight, said nothing would be done until the next morning. Thankfully an R.S.P.C.A. rescue worker, who lives locally and is very much an animal lover, came to our home to collect the dogs at around 7.30 a.m., even though she did not officially start her duty until 9.00 a.m. My main gripe had been that I believed the animals were in need of care the night before, but I was left feeling that "stray" dogs (although I suspect the word abandoned would befit them) however needy, did not concern an organisation that seeks support for its work as an animal charity.
Of Cornwall Council - certainly my phone bill can show that I telephoned the Council twice and indeed a very helpful lady even called me back at around 11.50 p.m., having attempted to discover (without success) who might help me with regards the dogs.
Should I have left the dogs drift into the night, rather than seek help for them? Of course not. However, the lack of support from an animal charity led me to curtail my conversation with the R.S.P.C.A. inspector with incredulity. What would have happened should I have left the sickly abandoned strays to go off alone? They would have remained sickly abandoned strays!”