Neasa Hourigan (Dublin Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will reiterate that we are 12 days away and none of us has seen those regulations. That is why there is an urgency about a delay. I have some more questions. The Minister of State mentioned issues such as exemption certificates. We do not know yet why, unlike the UK, no third-party public liability insurance is required for exemptions. We do not know what the conditions of exemptions are. We do not know about people in social housing who have signed contracts that prohibit them from owning dogs. It seems that they will be allowed to apply for exemptions. We do not see any indication that some dogs that have a history of violence and attacks would be prohibited from getting an exemption. For the first time in the history of this State, most local authorities, which will effectively be dealing with this alone, will not have veterinary services from January 2025 because we are in the process of moving all our veterinary services from local authorities to the Department of agriculture. Nobody in response to any of the parliamentary questions I have tabled can tell me what will happen next. When we talk about dogs, and at a later date, we can talk about horses’ veterinary services, nobody can tell me what will happen in terms of putting dogs down. Again, I will say that local authority staff are in real danger here.

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