Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State. In my introductory remarks I did acknowledge that the Government has done its bit in providing money for the charities. I note that the Department's response the Minister of State read out refers to this legislation is constantly being kept under review. Obviously I welcome this but I genuinely believe that we have more than enough legislation. It is there already. There are reams upon reams of legislation. Be it the Control of Horses Act or the Animal Health and Welfare Act, the powers are already there. All I am asking for is enforcement. The Department's response states that these "powers can be used" with regard to stray horses, or that "Local authorities may also prosecute offenders". We should be putting the local authorities to the pin of their collars: they must prosecute people and they must seize horses that are in distress or in an emaciated condition. They have to do this. It is incumbent on us to ensure that. It is currently a merry-go-round - is it the Garda, the local authority, the landowner or the Department of agriculture? That is what is happening and it is just a merry-go-round at the moment. If we are to be sincere about this and serious about tackling the issue then the only way to do it is to give responsibility to an individual within the local authority, preferably somebody we can actually ring on a Monday morning or Friday evening to say there is a stray horse below in the field or there is a stray horse out on the road and we are seriously concerned about this animal's welfare, and that we can actually talk to a person. At the moment people are being pushed around from pillar to post and animals are suffering.

I wish to read into the record that the total number of seizures of animals in 2020 was 819. On the face of it this looks quite good as it has decreased every year up to 2024, when we only seized 288. On the face of it this actually looks like this is happening less but I can tell the House that from my own constituency's perspective more and more of it is happening. The figures lead me to believe that the authorities are just doing less and they are relying more on charities to pick up the slack. Perhaps the Minister of State will take back to the Ministers my suggestion about the appointment of officers into the local authorities.

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