For More Than Nine Dogs Shelter Conditions Should Apply
The proposal of the Ministry of Agriculture:
Article 49. b
The owner of more than nine dogs that do not suckle anymore must meet the requirements of the Article 56, paragraph 8 of this Act, except in the case of working animals and dog breeding.
Opinion of the Association: We commend the initiative that the owners of a large number of animals should ensure adequate keeping conditions for dogs. However, we propose in this legal provision that the number of dogs, for which the owners must meet the requirements equal to those in shelters, should be increased to 20. In fact, in practice it may happen that a person has a large property and better conditions for keeping 15 dogs than someone else for three dogs. When it comes to the welfare of an animal, in this case the crucial thing should be the ability to provide adequate keeping conditions.
This is particularly important because this proposed provision complicates the work of temporary foster caregiver who are an important link in saving dogs from the streets and from the kill shelters. It is illogical to tighten the requirements like this for individuals and organizations that rescue animals while on the other hand, many local communities did not even start to enforce the legal provisions related to the establishment of shelters and animal protection, so only individuals and organizations perform their job, and they do it voluntarily and pro bono. Therefore, this proposed provision will significantly complicate the process of animal protection carried out by temporary foster caregiver and associations without shelter because it is difficult to meet all these conditions which are normally prescribed to shelters that take care of a larger number of animals.
We would like to point out the illogicality of excluding, from the proposed provision, the dog breeders who profit from the breeding, and at the same time they are not required to meet the animal shelter conditions. They directly benefit from this because many of them will still be able to keep the females and pups under the conditions that no one controls. On the other hand, the individuals, who in their own homes want to provide the temporary home for dogs that are waiting in shelters to be killed, will suffer from this. This will affect the long-term increase of the killing of animals in shelters.
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