Animal welfare act
Redwings is delighted that the Animal Welfare Act has officially replaced previous legislation, giving more power for welfare organisations to step in, take action and prevent suffering. The Animal Welfare Act still allows for the removal of an animal on the grounds of unnecessary suffering, but has also created a statutory ‘duty of care’ which means that anyone who owns or takes on responsibility for an animal must ensure that its basic needs are met.
Under the Animal Welfare Act, owners who keep their equines in
totally unsuitable conditions like this will now be liable for prosecution.
What is a duty of care?
This is the responsibility that every person who takes on a horse, pony, donkey or mule has to ensure that the equine’s needs are met at all times.
What are an equine’s needs?
Every animal has basic needs that have to be provided for. Without these needs being met, the animal’s quality of life will fall below an acceptable level or the animal will be at risk of suffering.
All equines need a diet that is designed for their individual needs, access to fresh water, somewhere suitable to live and veterinary care to maintain their health and wellbeing. Equines also need a lifestyle that enables them to express natural behaviour and meet some of their psychological needs.
Each equine should be treated as an individual with their own particular needs being understood by the person who cares for them. There are many factors which influence the individual needs of an equine, including breed, age, conformation, temperament and workload.
Donkeys and mules are different in many ways to horses and ponies and anyone responsible for a donkey or mule must be aware of the particular needs of these types of animal.
Donkeys are not just ponies with long ears. They have their own special requirements, which every donkey owner must fully understand.
Who is responsible for an equine?
Anyone who is the legal owner of a equine is ultimately responsible for ensuring that the equine’s needs are met. However, in many cases the day to day tasks involved in meeting the animal’s needs may be carried out by someone else. This could be an employee, for example a groom who works at a livery yard; a guardian, if a equine has been placed in a loan home; or a temporary arrangement, such as when the owner is on holiday or unwell.
It is up to every owner to ensure that if they pass the practical care of their equine to another individual, that they are satisfied that this person has appropriate knowledge and experience to look after the animal properly.
If an equine is put out on loan, a formal loan agreement should be drawn up to state exactly what is expected of both guardian and owner and what the equine requires on a day to day basis.
What will happen if an equine’s needs are not met?
Under the new Animal Welfare Act, it is an offence for a person not to meet the basic needs of an equine for which they are responsible. An owner or carer who is found not to be carrying out their duty of care may be served with an improvement notice. This notice will give the person a specific time within which to improve the standard of care they provide for their equine. The person will be told exactly what it is that they need to do to meet their duty of care and at the end of the specified time period, the professional who served the notice will revisit to ensure that the improvements have been carried out.
If a person has not complied with the improvement notice at the end of the time given, they will then be liable for prosecution under the Animal Welfare Act.
Who can issue an improvement notice?
The Animal Welfare Act gives statutory powers to the police and local authority representatives to issue improvement notices and take prosecutions when necessary. Other organisations are able to use the system of improvement notices but will follow these up with private, rather than statutory, prosecutions.
Redwings has chosen not to issue its own improvement notices at this stage. We will continue to work hard to investigate reports of neglect and abuse and work in partnership with other welfare organisations when a situation has the potential to lead to a prosecution. We anticipate taking an important role in helping people to understand what the needs of a horse, pony, donkey or mule are to help existing owners and to make sure that anyone thinking of taking on an equine is prepared for the responsibility involved.
Redwings has a range of leaflets to help people
understand the realities of caring for an equine.
Redwings’ Head of Welfare, Nic de Brauwere will also continue to make an invaluable contribution to prosecution cases as a committed equine veterinary surgeon with more than 15 years experience in the welfare industry.
So can every equine be guaranteed a good home now?
No law is able to create an ideal world. The wider public have very different ideas on what equine needs are. For example, some people worry that horses are kept outside in the winter; some people worry that horses are kept inside in the winter. Welfare professionals are limited in the number of cases they can deal with at any one time and the number of prosecutions that they can take against individuals. The priority will always be to focus energy and resources on the equines in most need of help.
Report a welfare concern
If you want to report a horse, pony or donkey that you are concerned about, please see our get in touch section.
