Mr. Paul Geraghty:

In regard to the ratio, it is under constant review. It is important to take the views of the local authority vets on board, which would be that there is a huge variance between the various dog breeding establishments. Some have a high degree of automation, which would mean that staff are freed up to spend more time with the dogs and pups if there are automated feeding stations, automating cleaning and so on. It is a slightly crude implement to use the ratio in a very strict way and we have to trust the local authority vets to apply common sense when they visit these establishments because of that sort of variance.

The Senator asked in regard to retirement plans for breeding bitches on dog breeding establishments. It is a stipulation of the Act that appropriate retirement plans should be in place for breeding bitches. We are not aware of dog breeding establishments advertising retired bitches as rescue dogs but we will look into that.