Dangerous Dogs

Jim Fitzpatrick Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Westminster Hall

[Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair this morning, Mr Bayley. I congratulate the hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), who saw off a lot of competition to secure this debate, on giving us all the opportunity to have this discussion with the Minister.

I asked about dangerous dogs twice last week in the House, at Home Office questions and in Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs questions. As the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Angie Bray) has just said, because the issue is cross-departmental, it is more complicated. However, I was grateful for the positive responses from both Ministers on the Treasury Bench. Also, as was referred to earlier, the coalition agreement is positive in that its programme for government states:

“We will promote responsible pet ownership…and will ensure that enforcement agencies target irresponsible owners of dangerous dogs.”

On the back of last year’s DEFRA consultation, which received more than 4,000 responses, I and other colleagues hope that the Minister will indicate the Government’s conclusions and the way forward.

I have had, as have many colleagues, various meetings with a number of organisations, most recently with the Dogs Trust, the Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the Association of Chief Police Officers. They all want a Bill. I am grateful to them for their briefings, and the consensus across the piece is that any Bill must consolidate legislation concerning dog control, allow greater flexibility and discretion to enforcers and the courts, include a genuine preventive effect, update some offences, improve public safety and animal welfare and reduce the cost of enforcement, all of which have been referred to by colleagues so far.

As the hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North said, breed-specific legislation is not effective in tackling the real cause of the problem, but should—there is agreement—relate to the owner’s acts and omissions rather than the type of dog. All the groups mentioned also believe that, without the political will to repeal breed-specific legislation, it must be amended to ensure better canine welfare and a clear strategy must be put in place to phase out the breed-specific legislation. The third main pillar of the consensus is that the scope of updated legislation must be extended to cover all places, including private property, to ensure better public safety and animal welfare. It must also provide suitable defences for responsible dog owners—for example, if people are attacked and their dog defends them. I want to focus a few remarks on the third point.

I was e-mailed by two constituents, Mr and Mrs Sprosson of Wapping. They were walking their dog last Friday and were subjected to a vicious attack by a dogo Argentino. Both their dog and Mr Sprosson were seriously injured. It was very much the usual story, with no owner in sight, although one eventually came into the open. My constituents are very unhappy with the response to their 999 calls to both the police and the ambulance—I am pursuing those concerns with the borough police commander and the chief executive of the London ambulance service—but those responses were almost symptomatic of the problem caused by inadequate legislation, which does not give the emergency services clear indications of how they ought to respond. Mrs Sprosson, in her e-mail, concluded:

“It is only a matter of time before this dog attacks again. Judging by its size, strength and alarming aggression it could easily kill a child and very badly damage an adult. What will it take for the police to address this terrible situation? How many more people will it be allowed to damage before they are forced to take action?”

The statistics, quoted by many and in the speeches this morning, are quite clear. We have seen a twelvefold increase in dog fighting between 2004 and 2008, according to figures from the RSPCA; 6,000-plus attacks on postal workers every year, according to the Communication Workers Union; 1,000-plus dogs seized by the Metropolitan police in 2009 and 2010, according to the Mayor of London’s office; and, sadly, as has been referred to, eight people killed and 197 seriously injured in the past four years. All of that is costing the taxpayer money, quite apart from the untold suffering.

I have not mentioned compulsory microchipping for all dogs, which many of us support, although perhaps not the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray). That would be a modern, 21st-century solution to registering dogs, tracking owners and ensuring that those responsible are held to account when things go wrong.

In conclusion, there is cross-party, animal welfare, police and public support for a Bill dealing with dangerous dogs and irresponsible owners. The Minister is sympathetic and DEFRA and the Home Office want to make progress. Colleagues in the Chamber are not being over-critical but genuinely trying to be helpful in giving momentum to what Ministers and civil servants want to achieve, which is updating the legislation.