Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I express my personal support for the Bill and that of the Labour Party. It is very timely and welcome legislation. We have had quite a number of animal welfare discussions in the Seanad over the years and I am sure it will come as no surprise to anyone to hear where I fall on this Bill. I commend Senator Boylan on all her work, not only on this Bill but on animal welfare generally and especially canine welfare. It is a topic that is considered important by many people in Ireland. We consider ourselves animal lovers, yet when any of us goes into a rescue centre we can see how animals have been treated. We see the conditions in which they do their best to look after animals. We hear of the animals that never got to make it to the rescue centre. That holds a mirror up to us and shines a light on the notion that Ireland is a country of animal lovers. It is unfortunate that there are people who give the real animal lovers from all sorts of backgrounds a terrible name. The cruelty that I and all those in the animal rescue centres have witnessed is incomprehensible. It beggars belief that in 2022 we still see stories on the news or shared in our social media timelines weekly or daily of really upsetting animal cruelty.

I commend Senator Boylan and Sinn Féin on introducing this legislation which we hope will tackle some of the issues, outliers and problems in this area. We can always amend Irish law on animal welfare to make it better. There no question but that the Health and Welfare Act 2013 was a significant step forward for animal welfare in Ireland. This positive Bill will hopefully make the Act better and stronger.

When we talk about this topic, part of the challenge is getting people to shift their perception. All is not well in this area. We see the call to "Adopt, don't shop" and various other advertisements, and people buy cards to support the sector, but I still am not sure that people are as switched on to the issue as they could be.

I will reflect on some of the penalties relating to animal welfare breaches. The Bill proposes a significant increase in some of the penalties, for example, it proposes changing the €100 fine "that on summary conviction, to a class B fine or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to both, or (b) on conviction on indictment, to a fine not exceeding €250,000 or imprisonment for a term not exceeding 5 years, or to both." This section relates more to the abuse of dog licences than animal welfare, which is the issue I am discussing. However, any increase in penalties in the area of dog licensing could and should lead to less mistreatment or abuse of animals. Previous speakers outlined the licensing situation and its impact. I was doing some research earlier on the types of sentences people have been given in the past couple of years for animal mistreatment or cruelty. In 2018, a judge in Ireland gave a suspended sentence for the breach of the Animal Health and Welfare Act because the defendant had been on prescription drugs at the time. The judge said that he was a contributing member of society so it was better if he was not in jail. I am not a particularly big advocate of locking people up in jail with wild abandon but convictions and penalties in this area are lacking. They are poorly enforced. Perhaps that is partly because we rely so much on animal welfare charities, particularly the ISPCA and DSPCA to go out to inspect for animal welfare breaches. Animal welfare charities have received funding of more than €5.8 million.This is a €2 million increase over the past two years. It is not to be sniffed at, but it is still a small amount considering the €91 million allocated to the Horse and Greyhound Fund. We discussed that fund at length here a couple of weeks ago. I want to put on the record that animal welfare resources are desperately underfunded and rely mostly on charities. We can create laws and regulations, and I hope the Bill gets Government support and is moved along, but without adequate funding, not much is going to change.

According to the ISPCA, it takes €50,000 to keep one inspector on the road. If every penny of that €5 million was invested in inspectors, it would still only give us 116 inspectors. That does not seem to be enough, even if every penny of the money going to all of the charities was invested in inspectors. We are woefully under-resourcing and under-supporting the people who will regulate not all of the areas in the Bill but a number of areas.

We fully support the Bill. I commend Senator Boylan and Sinn Féin on bringing it forward. There is no question in this House about my thoughts on animal welfare, in particular canine welfare. We have a long way to go and I hope the Government will seize this opportunity to use this Bill to move us a little bit closer to where we need to be.