Email me at Mike Emery. All financial contributions are cheerfully accepted. If you want to keep it private, use my PGP Key. Home Page
RSPCA is short for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. It was founded in 1824 by
Wilberforce was also instrumental in outlawing Slavery.
The RSPCA was a worthy
outfit once. Now it is deeply political and much too close to
Her Majesty's Government. It went
wrong and was proven wrong in 1985 in the
Attorney General versus
the RSPCA. They got sorted. Protect yourself against them by looking at
The Law and the RSPCA. They are keen on
prosecuting people of one sort or another, with fanatic zeal but somehow they
have not managed to do it to the
League Against Cruel Sports, who, name notwithstanding treat deer on
their land shocking bad. Letting them starve to death qualifies as cruelty and
as crime but they get a pass, just like the Jews who like
Kosher Slaughter.
PS They also go easy on American outfit called
People for the Ethical
Treatment of Animals [
PETA for short ].
There is the
The Dark Side of PETA - Serial Mercy Killings, Misleading Campaigns, And Pseudoscience.
Ritual Slaughter
You might think that the RSPCA would care about Kosher Slaughter, killing animals when they are conscious. You might think they should care. Perhaps they do but pandering to Jews matters more. Zionist crazies are too influential. Ditto for Islamics. You doubt? See Englishmen Oppose Jews And Muslims Over Animal Slaughter.
SPECIAL INVESTIGATION Five suicides. One common thread They all fell foul of the RSPCA
The RSPCA can endanger your life.
Kosher Slaughter
Kosher slaughter is cruel. Does the RSPCA care in the slightest? No chance. Jews are more important than animal welfare. The RSPCA is too political, too corrupt to see it any other way. Money rides on it. Livelihoods do too. The boss man is seriously well paid. That is how he likes it.
RSPCA - Animadversion
Feeds you the dirt, dirt like Perverting The Course Of Justice and some pointers for help should you need it. Offering a man a £5,000 bribe to commit perjury and threatening to give false information if he refused is a pretty convincing example. There was a nice new tape recording of the event.
The RSPCA Countered
There are people out there doing things about the RSPCA attacks. Learn the answers before you need them.
Self Help Group for Farmers and Other Victims of the RSPCA - http://the-shg.org/ is the new web site address
QUOTE
The RSPCA are well known in the farming community as being unreasonable extremists whose main aim seems to be the kudos gained from glamorous prosecutions. There is actually a self help group for farmers (and others!) experiencing difficulties with the RSPCA. I do quite a bit of work for them. Here's an article which appeared in Y Tir and Welsh Farmer in October 1997
RSPCA Self Help Group
In 1990, a small group of farmers who believed they had been unreasonably and unfairly 'targeted' by the RSPCA formed a self-help group. Problems experienced can range from the frustration felt when anonymous, malicious telephone calls result in the embarrassment of a visit by a uniformed 'official' in a clearly marked RSPCA van, to the financial devastation caused by a prosecution resulting in an order banning the defendant from keeping animals. The RSPCA is an extremely wealthy and powerful organisation, able to draw on vast resources and past experience in any situation. It employs solicitors who are experts in animal law, and appears to have unlimited funds to spend on prosecution costs. Ranks, uniforms and the name RSPCA serve to impress both members of the public and, unfortunately, some magistrates.
UNQUOTE
Jack In Office is a tyrant. Abusing power is fun.
RSPCA ex Wiki
QUOTE
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) is a charity in England and Wales that promotes animal welfare. In 2009, the RSPCA investigated 141,280 cruelty complaints and collected and rescued 135,293 animals. It is the oldest and largest animal welfare organisation in the world and is one of the largest charities in the UK, with 1,505 employees (as of 2008).The charity's work has inspired the creation of similar groups in other nations, starting with the Ulster Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Northern Ireland and including the Scottish Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Scottish SPCA or SSPCA), Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Australia, the Royal New Zealand Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RNZSPCA), and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
The RSPCA is funded entirely by voluntary donations. No state or lottery funding is received. In 2008, total income was GBP 119,926,000, total expenditure was GBP 114,090,000, and reserves were GBP 70,656,000. Its patron is Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
UNQUOTE
It was started by the comedian who outlawed slavery. This reads like an advertising prospectus.
Multiculturalism Rears Its Ugly Head In The RSPCA [ 27 May 2006 ]
They are very annoyed about the way that pigs are treated in Taiwan. They don't like cruelty. When it comes to Kosher Slaughter that is just fine. Jews like it. Their victims do not. Who cares? Not the RSPCA. Halal slaughter? You guessed but it is Islamics who don't care any more than the RSPCA.
PS They hate hunting too. That is cruel because Englishmen do it. Class war matters more than cruelty to animals at the RSPCA.
RSPCA Appoints Chief Executive With Handsome Remuneration Package
QUOTE
The RSPCA is announcing a series of major investments as it appoints Mark Watts as its new chief executive.
A multi-million pound programme of modernisation is underway at the charity, including new handheld mobile technology for RSPCA inspectors and animal collection officers (ACOs), a new online rehoming service for the public and other investments in animal welfare. Mark (63) has worked at the RSPCA for more than 28 years, most recently as the charity's director of corporate services, overseeing the RSPCA's financial and technology planning.
UNQUOTE
The RSPCA is a corporation which looks after its own. Screwing the peasants and spending lots of money on public relations are just part of the game. RICHARD LITTLEJOHN is scathing on malicious apparatchiks.
RSPCA Driven By Unprincipled Greed [ 21 February 2010 ]
QUOTE
RSPCA's court attempt to double £300,000 left in will of animal lover slammed by judge as 'patently wrong'
The RSPCA was criticised by a judge today for taking the heirs of a wealthy donor to the High Court in an attempt to increase its share of his estate.
George Mason divided his £1million estate between the animal charity, his brother John and two friends, Norman and Patricia Sharp.
But, under Britain's complicated tax laws, the RSPCA was concerned it was going to have to pay inheritance tax on its share of the estate.........So it took Mr. Mason and the Sharps to court to try to get them to pay some of the tax out of their bequests. However Mr. Justice Peter Smith said the RSPCA's claim was 'extremely weak' and 'patently wrong'. 'It is a matter of regret that this action was ever brought,' the judge said today........... He refused the charity permission to appeal and said he hoped it would accept his decision because if the case went to the Court of Appeal it would 'cause more concern and stress' to Mr. Mason, 85, and the Sharps, who are in their seventies.........
The case comes just two weeks after the RSPCA was ordered to pay the bulk of £1.3million legal costs after losing a lengthy court battle against Christine Gill, who was disinherited by her mother’s gift to the charity. Judge James Allen QC punished the charity for refusing to negotiate before the case came to court.
UNQUOTE
The RSPCA has an ugly track record including attempted bribery to give false witness to pervert the course of justice.
RSPCA Screwed A Barrister Who Kept Beating Them [ 20 May 2013 ]
RSPCA Is Run By Left Wing Fanatics [ 28 December 2013 ]
RSPCA Is Vicious [ 29 December 2013 ]
"The RSPCA has turned into a “sinister and nasty” organisation, the head of the Countryside Alliance warns today......The charity has become more interested in animal rights than promoting welfare, while its inspectors have been given intrusive powers with no proper basis in law,.......... Sir Barney said the BBC’s coverage of the countryside was neither fair nor balanced. Countryfile, its flagship rural affairs programme, failed to report on issues such as shooting."
In fact The RSPCA inspectors pretend they have police powers. They are bunch of chancers with an ugly agenda. That is when they are not bringing Malicious prosecutions or Perverting the course of justice. Every movement begins as a cause, becomes a business then becomes a racket. Think e.g. about Blair and the Labour Party; or the BBC protecting Paedophiles.
RSPCA Gone Bad Say Two Trustees [ 1 March 2016 ]
QUOTE
Two long serving trustees at the RSPCA have resigned, with one attacking the longstanding animal charity for its "appalling" decision to allow a trustee to continue as acting chief executive for the past two years.Christopher Laurence [ a vet ] and Sally Phillips have both quit in the past five months, expressing concern about how the animal charity - one of the oldest in the world - is being run.................
The news is a further blow to the charity which has been battling a slew of negative headlines about its animal welfare work and pursuit of hunts for alleged breaches of the hunting ban.
The Daily Telegraph disclosed last week how the charity had banned its inspectors from rehoming animals unless vets have personally seen evidence of suffering, in what critics said was an admission that they have been acting "over-zealously".
There are also concerns that the RSPCA could be abandoned by the Royal family unless it returns to its roots in animal welfare rather than campaigning against countryside sports.
UNQUOTE
A decent outfit went wrong when the Lunatic Fringe moved in.
The Future Of The RSPCA from the Countryside Alliance
QUOTE
Four years ago, when we faced the prospect of an extended battle with the RSPCA with more than a little trepidation, the current state of the Society would have been unthinkable. This week the Charity Commission announced that it had instructed the charity to carry out an independent review of its governance following the resignation of two trustees and its inability to recruit a Chief Executive for two years. This came hot on the heels of the announcement of wide ranging reforms in response to a previous review of its prosecution operation. Amongst other things those changes included a new policy not to bring prosecutions against farmers or hunts.
Back in 2012 all this was unthinkable, but for us there was little choice about locking horns with one of Britain's largest, best funded and most respected charities. After decades of flirting with animal rights extremism the Society's council, which is elected by a dwindling number of members, had finally taken the plunge and chosen a new Chief Executive who almost immediately declared war on large parts of the rural community. Farmers involved in the badger cull were to be "named and shamed", the Grand National banned and, of course, foxhunters, especially those with the wrong accents, hounded out of existence.
The subsequent arguments over policy, politics and prosecutions have been widely reported and the RSPCA subjected to extraordinary criticism. There are, of course, a few extremists who continue to support, a more radical and aggressive RSPCA, but if the last few years have proved anything it is that whilst the British public might be obsessed with animals, it also loathes extremism, bullying and hypocrisy.
Unfortunately the simplest and most obvious solution to its current situation is the one that the Society is the least willing to contemplate. It seems so obvious that the RSPCA's first step on the road to redemption should be to drop its 19th century private prosecution model in favour of a 21st relationship with the police, other statutory bodies such as local authorities and the CPS. Its Scottish sister organisation, the SSPCA, has managed to deliver its role in just such a way in a legal jurisdiction that makes private prosecution very difficult. There is absolutely no reason the RSPCA could not do the same south of the border.
Thus far, however, the Society has refused to contemplate this step, even going as far as excluding any discussion of its prosecuting role from the review of its prosecutions. Surely now, however, when the RSPCA is asking itself how to end the controversy and refocus on the vitally important role of protecting the welfare of animals, the obsession with being a quasi-statutory prosecuting authority must come under scrutiny. It is exactly that outdated prosecutions model that has brought the great institution that is the RSPCA to its knees.Tim Bonner
Chief Executive
Follow on Twitter @CA_TimB
UNQUOTE
A moderate man writes.
RSPCA Admits Evil [ 13 May 2016 ]
The new boss talks about a new start, caring about animal welfare rather than animal rights. The RSPCA has sales revenue of £124 million and tax breaks. The previous man was a council house peasant with a track record as another ghastly Leftie, full of hate & greed; compassion be damned. Grant departed due to 'stress' in spite of the very adequate remuneration package.
RSPCA Still Run By Animal Rights Fascists [ 21 May 2016 ]
QUOTE
On Saturday it seemed, for a moment, that the RSPCA had taken the first step towards redemption and repairing its battered reputation. New Chief Executive, Jeremy Cooper, gave a frank and honest interview to the Daily Telegraph in which he apologised for the Society's failings in recent times whilst reiterating, quite rightly, the extraordinary work that most of its staff do most of the time. In particular he emphasised that the RSPCA must be an animal welfare, not animal rights, organisation and that it had been 'too political' and 'too adversarial'.
Mr Cooper was rewarded with a supportive editorial entitled 'There is hope at last for the RSPCA' and further positive press coverage including a leader from the Mail on Sunday which concluded "The RSPCA’s recognition that it is primarily an animal welfare organisation rather than an animal rights campaign is a major step in the right direction".
The result of such honesty, and the first decent press the RSPCA has received in recent years, was an entirely predictable backlash from animal rights extremists, and the fact that Mr Cooper had mentioned hunting and badgers caused them to froth at the mouth even more than usual.............This U-turn, and most of the problems that have come before, can be traced back to the RSPCA's governance and in particular its wholly elected council, voted for by a few hundred of its membership of around 20,000. It is reported that other candidates were offered Mr Cooper's job and turned it down because of the dysfunctional structure and significant extremist element on the council. This week's events fully justify their decisions.
UNQUOTE
A moderate man writes. The Lunatic Fringe is full of hate.
RSPCA Murdered One Cat & Stole Two More [ 10 July 2016 ]
The RSPCA is a bunch of arrogant rogues, the kind of Animal rights fanatics who eagerly import Third World criminals to defile England and congratulate themselves on their superior Morality.
RSPCA Stole Cat [ 23 August 2016 ]
The RSPCA is a once decent outfit gone bad. It was started by Wilberforce, of the anti-slavery movement. That is another lot gone off, infested by the Lunatic Fringe & controlled by the Puppet Masters, the Zionist crazies. Animal rights fanatics are bad enough. The others are flooding England with Third World savages to destroy it.
RSPCA Spies On Donors' Finances [ 7 December 2016 ]
QUOTE
Major charities have shown ‘widespread disregard’ for the privacy of their millions of donors by routinely snooping on them and passing on their private details, the Information Commissioner said last night.The RSPCA admitted snooping on all seven million of its donors without consent - routinely carrying out checks on their wealth, and in some cases trying to work out how much they might leave in their wills. And Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham said other charities had also been found carrying out similar activities.
Announcing fines to the RSPCA and the British Heart Foundation for sharing their donors’ details and secretly prying into their wealth, she said: ‘Our investigations suggest that these activities are also being carried out by some other charities.’........
The data watchdog said yesterday that the RSPCA had ‘abused the trust’ of its seven million donors by repeatedly paying investigators to pry into their wealth.........................
They also ‘traded personal details’ of hundreds of thousands of donors, ‘creating a massive pool of donor data for sale’, the ICO found.
UNQUOTE
The RSPCA is a crooked mob; another business with tax breaks. They won't even apologise for their evil. Other Charities are outright criminal organisations, systematically importing Third World aliens by the thousand. See Charity And Crime
Government Considers Stopping Malicious Prosecutions By The RSPCA [ 26 December 2016 ]
QUOTE
Pressure was mounting inside Whitehall last night for the RSPCA to be stripped of the power to prosecute in hunting and animal cruelty cases.Senior ministers and MPs say there is a clear ‘conflict of interest’ over the fact the animal charity both investigates and brings offences to court......................
The news was welcomed by the Countryside Alliance. Campaigners now hope that – when the Government responds to a scathing report by MPs – it will opt for a new law that puts the CPS in charge of prosecuting all RSPCA cases. The charity would be left solely with an investigative role – just like the police in relation to other criminal offences.
UNQUOTE
The RSPCA is run by ghastly Socialists who manage to look after their own very adequate lifestyles. Every movement begins as a cause, becomes a business then a racket. Plenty of other charities are corrupt; see the next one. Some are criminals running Illegal Immigration operations; inflicting hundreds of thousands of Third World parasites on us.
RSPCA Is Bent [ 14 June 2017 ]
QUOTE
The RSPCA was thrown into more chaos last night following reports the charity spent almost £1million on a luxury home for just a dozen cats and the daughter of chairwoman who lives there rent free. The claims come after scathing criticism of its management from the Charity Commission in the wake of the sudden departure of its chief executive.Daughter of RSPCA national council chairwoman Daphne Harris, Katie Toms, 39, lives at the semi-detached four bedroom house in Headcorn, Kent, rent free, the Sun reported. The home was bought in 2011 for £464,935 by the local branch of the RSPCA, which is run by Mrs Harris.
There were two further outlays of cash - £138,323 and £137,277 - the paper reported, as well as £223,969 in wages and expenses since 2011 and a £40,000 car Mrs Toms is thought to have the use of........
His departure from the £150,000-a-year post after 15 months comes a fortnight before the June 24 annual meeting of the charity, which has an annual income of £144million and employs more than 1,500 staff.
A source told the Times it was unacceptable to lose the experienced businessman and added: ‘This is a disgrace and it is high time the Charity Commission took over the day-to-day management of the charity to safeguard animal protection. There had been no mention of him leaving.’
UNQUOTE
Perhaps this does not amount to fraud; it just looks like it. The RSPCA is run malicious rogues. Other outfits abuse their Charitable status by becoming smugglers, importing thousands of Third World parasites on the make. For evidence see Criminal Charities. One of them is Save The Children, run by Helle Thorning-Schmidt, lately the prime minister of Denmark. She is above the law. Finance for these crime comes from enemies of Western Civilization. One such is almost certainly George Soros, one of the Puppet Masters. It is not just Ethnic Fouling, it is Genocide. Coconspirators include Her Majesty's Government & other Zionist Occupation Governments [ ZOGs ].
RSPCA Wants Police Powers [ 8 July 2017 ]
QUOTE
The RSPCA is seeking new police powers to allow hundreds of its inspectors to enter private property and seize pets, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.The charity is in talks with police chiefs and the Government about new statutory powers to allow its inspectors to gain access to gardens, sheds and outhouses without a police officer.
The news appalled some MPs and campaign groups. One MP said the "RSPCA is a welfare charity not a private police force".
The organisation wants the new powers despite a cross-party group of MPs publishing a report last November in which the RSPCA was accused of “targeting vulnerable, ill and elderly” people and removing their pets.
UNQUOTE
The RSPCA had decent objectives but went wrong. They use blackmail and bribery to Pervert The Course Of Justice - see RSPCA - Animadversion
Bringing The RSPCA To Heel [ 18 May 2018 ]
QUOTE
The Charity Commission stated last year that the RSPCA’s governance is below standard and threatened regulatory action. Yet nothing has changed. The RSPCA continues with an overlarge council mostly elected by a tiny number of members. It has refused to implement time restrictions on Trustees in contravention of guidance, which is highlighted by one council member who has served continuously since 1972. Despite commitments to the contrary, there has been no attempt to add to the number of voting members through recruitment, despite huge fundraising campaigns seeking donations. It has also ignored the recommendation of the EFRA committee that it should refrain from being a criminal prosecutor of first resort and continues to spend millions of pounds on a role which is neither sensible or necessary.The RSPCA has not even implemented the recommendations of its own internal governance review, let alone come up to the standards of best practice recommended by the Charity Commission. Yet the Charity Commission seems no closer taking the regulatory action it promised last year.
This matters more than ever because there is now a plethora of animal rights organisations registered as charities, and the fact that the highest profile animal charity of them all is so able to ignore the guidance, advice and even threats of the regulator undoubtedly encourages them ignore Charity Commission guidance too. Millions of pounds of charitable donations are being spent on campaigns that are at least questionable, and sometimes simply dishonest, instead of being used to address real animal welfare issues. The Charity Commission’s regulation of the RSPCA is a test case, and as long as it fails to implement any change in that charity others will consider that they can treat the regulator in exactly the same way.
UNQUOTE
They have no intention of cleaning up their act. Nor it seems has the Charity Commission.
RSPCA Marketing Expensive Dog Training [ 13 October 2018 ]
QUOTE
The plot thickens. Defra is planning to ban dog e-collars despite there having never been a prosecution for misuse, its admission that its science doesn’t justify a ban, and its consultation revealing only 8% support for a ban. The 300,000barbaric dog torturersloving dog owners who use them would, if Defra goes ahead, be forced to keep their pets permanently on the lead to stop them attacking livestock. Or put them down.So why did Defra suddenly feel the need to rush through these emergency powers to criminalise dog lovers when current legislation already has tough anti-cruelty measures? This is a classic case of a department not building policy on science but being led by the nose by campaigning charities...........
Enter the Kennel Club. Two weeks ago, The Times reported that the civil war enveloping the club had become so severe that its solicitors had sent a “muzzling” letter to the club’s members. The Times described “a culture of fear” in this “badly managed… vindictive and spiteful” organisation...............
Yet what do you expect from money-grabbing businesses? The Mayfair-based Kennel Club is described by The Times as “a highly successful business,” while Dogs Trust makes £106m a year and the RSPCA £143m from monetising the British love of animals.................
Yet the dirty little secret is that Kennel Club and Dogs Trust are both focused on growing their dog training businesses. What better way to grow this business than to ban the technology used by 300,000 dog owners to control their pets without paying for expensive dog whisperers? Defra has been played by some capitalist wolves dressed in sheep’s clothing.
UNQUOTE
The Charity Industry is Big Business with tax breaks. The RSPCA is there like a rat up a drainpipe. The self-righteous, the Puritanical are often vicious too; Criminal Charities are doing major people smuggling; importing Third World parasites into Europe & Western Civilization. It is Ethnic Fouling leading seamlessly to Genocide. That is the point.
RSPCA Gripped By The Charity Commission [ 18 January 2021 ]
QUOTE
Just before Christmas the Charity Commission issued a press release saying that it had secured “significant changes to the way the RSPCA is led and governed”. This came almost eight years to the day since a case in Oxford Magistrates’ court which was the catalyst for the most turbulent period in the RSPCA’s 197-year history. That was the day the RSPCA’s then Chief Executive declared war on the countryside, and the Countryside Alliance took a stand that has been entirely vindicated and resulted in fundamental changes to the RSPCA. Those changes will benefit the RSPCA and help secure its future, but more importantly they will mean that the Society’s focus will return to improving the welfare of animals...........In 2018, as chaos continued to engulf the RSPCA, the Charity Commission finally issued it with an official warning about its governance and leadership. After intensive regulatory action the RSPCA finally brought forward changes to “truly transform the Society” in 2019 which allowed the Charity Commission to announce before Christmas that the RSPCA was no longer in special measures and that the relationship between the regulator and charity was back on an “ordinary footing”.
I am quite certain that had the Alliance not taken the stand it did to challenge the agenda of the RSPCA, these changes would not have happened, and I am proud that we did. It was the Alliance and its members who stood up to the bullying and exposed the agenda of those who sought to use the RSPCA as a political tool. And I am pleased that whilst we may still disagree on some issues, not least the RSPCA’s continuing obsession with private prosecutions, that we can now work together on campaigns that actually improve the welfare of animals.
UNQUOTE
Another Lunatic Fringe operation is slowed down. It may need sorting out again. The RSPCA did nothing about the League Against Cruel Sports Killing Deer Slowly, Painfully Using Systematic Neglect or the blatant cruelty of Jews using Kosher Slaughter.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals ex Wiki
) is an American animal rights nonprofit organization based in Norfolk, Virginia, and led by Ingrid Newkirk, its international president. PETA reports that PETA entities have more than 9 million members globally.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETAFounded in March 1980 by Newkirk and animal rights activist Alex Pacheco, the organization first caught the public's attention in the summer of 1981 during what became known as the Silver Spring monkeys case.[4] The organization opposes factory farming, fur farming, animal testing, and other activities the group considers as exploitation of animals.
Euthanasia and PETA's shelter
PETA is a strong proponent of euthanasia. They oppose the no-kill movement, and rather than adoption programs, PETA prefers to aim for zero births through spaying and neutering.[98] They recommend not breeding pit bulls, and support euthanasia in certain situations for animals in shelters, such as those being housed for long periods in cramped cages.[99]PETA calls their shelter in Norfolk, Virginia a "shelter of last resort", claiming they only receive old, sick, injured, badly behaved, and otherwise unadoptable animals. Operating as open admission, they take in animals no one else will, and consider death a merciful end. The consistently high percentage of animals euthanized at PETA's shelter has been controversial.[100][101] In 2014, PETA euthanized over 80% of the shelter's animals and justified its euthanasia policies as "mercy killings".[102][103]
In 2008, industry lobby group Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF) petitioned the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, requesting they reclassify PETA as a "slaughterhouse." CCF said in a news release that "[a]n official report filed by PETA itself shows that the animal rights group put to death nearly every dog, cat, and other pet it took in for adoption in 2006," with a kill rate of 97.4 percent.[104] In 2012, VDACS said that it had in the past considered changing PETA's status from "shelter" to "euthanasia clinic," citing PETA's willingness to take in "anything that comes through the door, and other shelters won't do that."[105] PETA acknowledged that it euthanized 95% of the animals at its shelter in 2011.[105]
PETA's euthanasia practices have drawn intense scrutiny from lawmakers and criticism from animal rights activists for years. Fueled by public outrage from a 2014 incident where PETA workers took a pet Chihuahua from its porch and euthanized it the same day, the Virginia General Assembly passed Senate Bill 1381 in 2015 aimed at curtailing the operation of PETA's shelter. The bill defines a private animal shelter as "a facility operated for the purpose of finding permanent adoptive homes for animals."[100][106] Though risking their legal access to euthanasia drugs, PETA has continued their practices.[100][101] In the Chihuahua case, PETA paid a fine and settled a civil claim with the family three years later.[107]
The Law and the RSPCA
By Dr.Barry Peachey LLB(Hons), LLM, PhD, FCollP, MBAE, ACIArb, FETC
THIS ARTICLE is written in my joint
capacities as Legal Adviser to a number of dog organisations, and Chairman of
the Legal Aid Working Party of the British Academy of Experts.
I had been
approached by a number of dog people, and by fellow professional members of the
Academy, and asked to clear up a number of misconceptions about the
RSPCA and
the law that appear to be widely held and indeed publicly fostered by the
Society itself.
Members of the Inspectorate in senior positions have on various occasions stated in public that they have a cavalier disregard for the law, and the protections that it affords to suspects. On September 3, 1992, Chief Inspector John Paul gave evidence at Richmond-on-Thames Magistrates’ Court in the case of David MacKay. During cross examination, defense barrister Mr Thomas Derbyshire asked the RSPCA man: "Are you telling this court that you encourage your staff to flagrantly disregard civil and legal rights in the pursuit of your ends?" Chief Inspector Paul replied: "My duty is to look after the animals, and if that involves infringing people’s civil or legal rights then so be it. The animals cannot defend themselves so we have to do it for them."
It is a matter of public record that in this case the RSPCA had illegally entered property, and illegally seized animals The recent RSPCA television series Animal Squad – Undercover which appeared on , Channel 4 featured Chief Superintendent Donald Balfour, Head of the RSPCA Special Operations Unit. He was asked on camera by a police officer if he had any legal powers to do what he was proposing to do. His reply was "Officially no, but we do it all the time."
In the recent press release in which the Society announced that they would be withdrawing their staff from prosecutions under Sl Dangerous Dogs Act 1991, they described the five men concerned as "qualified as expert witnesses". They are nothing of the sort, and this is yet another wilful misrepresentation of their legal position. The qualifying body for expert witnesses in this country is the British Academy of Experts. Only holders of full professional membership, or fellowship in the practicing category of membership are "qualified" as expert witnesses. The law is that any expert may give expert evidence if they can satisfy the court as to their expertise, but there is a vast difference between that and Academy membership. None of the RSPCA Inspectors authorised by the Society are Academy Members or Fellows, not the least because the academy requires candidates to be educated to at least first degree level, to have chartered or equivalent status in their primary profession, and to be able to pass an extensive and demanding vetting procedure, covering professional conduct and competence.
At present only three of the experts who have regularly appeared in Dangerous Dogs Act cases are on the professional register of the Academy All of them are Panel Members of the A.G. Fox litigation consultancy practice.
The RSPCA has sought to present the
withdrawal of its staff from these cases as an effort to protect innocent dogs.
That is an exercise in hypocrisy that is unsurpassed. The truth is that it has
been driven off the field by a whole series of crushing defeats in the courts
that have made the staff concerned look amateurish in the face of true experts,
in an exercise that in my view has brought the Society into gross disrepute.
The above article was printed in Our Dogs magazine May 21st. 1993 and still
holds true today.
Any comments, thoughts or suggestions that you may have would be welcome. Please write
Errors
& omissions,
broken links, cock ups, over-emphasis, malice [ real or imaginary ] or
whatever; if you find any I am open to comment.
Email me at Mike
Emery.
All financial contributions are cheerfully accepted. If you want to
keep it
private, use my PGP Key. Home Page
Updated onSaturday, 01 October 2022 17:51:25