The New Animal Protection Act has been halted - and animals are going to suffer

This is not the blog post that I wanted to write.  When I started the post everything was sunshine and lollipop's - the minister of Agriculture was releasing a new and improved Animal Protection Act that would better serve the animals of Nova Scotia - who could have a problem with that?  Well we woke up yesterday and realized that a certain demographic had a big problem with it - can you guess who?

I am going to try and write this post without showing the anger that I feel in my heart towards the people who have put a halt to the ANIMAL PROTECTION ACT - and I have put that in capitals - the Animal PROTECTION Act of Nova Scotia - can you guess who have problems with this Act?

You are right - people who make money off the companion animals of Nova Scotia - BREEDERS.

Now I have always been PRO-breeder.  I have.  I have always been a person who sticks up for responsible breeders.  But NO MORE.  After reading the things that they have written last night and today - the paranoid, untrue, absolutely reprehensible things that they have said to try and push their agendas - it is really unbelievable the things they are saying because they still want to be able to cut the tails, ears and dewclaws off their puppies - and to hell with all the other animals in this province.

So I am going to compare the Animal Protection Act as it's been up until now and the proposed new Animal Protection Act and show how they are LYING TO YOU to try and push their own agenda.

So here we go.

First up is the CKC (Canadian Kennel Club) representative on CBC News last night lying on TV:



So here are some of the lies that this lady says in the CBC piece:

The CKC lady said she had two problems with the proposed new Animal Protection Act:

The first problem was that "they were not consulted" - she said the Minister's Forum has members that include the NSVMA, the department of Agriculture, the SPCA, but there was no representation of the CKC, or groomers, or trainers, or exhibitors, or pet owners, and the cat fancy was not invited either.

So let's break this down and clear up her confusion.

Beginning in 2013 Minister of Agriculture for Nova Scotia Keith Colwell began meeting with advocates from around Nova Scotia - owners of animal rescues, dog trainers, veterinarians and various employees of the government to talk about issues relating to animal advocacy in the province and how we could make things better for the dogs and cats and companion animals in the province.

Ms. Gratton is completely wrong when she talks about the makeup of the Minister's Forum - I am not going to mention names because I'm going to respect their privacy - but there are indeed a groomer, more than one dog trainer, the head of the NSVMA, representation from the Union of Nova Scotia Municipalities, someone from cat fancy, members from cat rescues, members from dog rescues, Hope Swinamer - who represents everything, members from the SPCA, representation from the Department of Agriculture, and of course - me.  Oh - and a member of the CKC.

Since 2013 we have talked about how can we make Minister Colwell's life easier and to help the animals of Nova Scotia - we have mostly helped with the regulations - but also what would help with the Animal Protection Act - so I was blissfully happy when I read the Act that was put out a few days ago.

Why was I happy?

There are a few things that I've been very unhappy about in the last year that I've blogged about here - the first one was the Animal Cruelty Appeal Board.

They were operating with absolutely no transparency and were giving dogs back to people for seemingly no good reason - and it was actually the SPCA who contacted me about it - they were putting so much work into rescuing dogs in obvious distress - and then having to give them back to the owners.  And then the crown attorneys were unwilling to progress with cruelty charges because this board - people with no qualifications whatsoever - judge and jury - had given dogs back to allegedly abusive owners - I talked about it in - these posts:

There are 4 posts and this is the first one and there are links to the other three from here
"What does the Animal Cruelty Appeal Board have to hide?"

The second problem Ms. Gratton has is:  the over reaching powers that this will give Inspectors if the law goes through - it will give them the right, without notice come to a persons kennel and demand to be let in and they (the SPCA I'm assuming) would have the right to search and seize any animals.  They could take away any materials they might want to take - and this is where it applies to pet owners as well - the only thing about here is that you would have a it of notice and you would have to bring your animal out to the Inspector - and we're not for a minute saying that the SPCA Inspectors have agendas, but the way the law is written if someone were to have an agenda they could exercise a lot of hardships for our members.

The interview ends with the interviewer asking Ms. Gratton about tail docking saying that the NSVMA has deemed it to be cruel and asked Ms. Gratton whether she and other breeders thought it was cruel and she replied that - No she did not think it was cruel.

So on to her second problem - and here we are at the crux of the problem - this is a huge dog whistle - a complete lie that the CKC is trying to send all over the internet to confuse people and make them angry so that they will contact their MLA to stop the passage of this Act.

I mean who wants someone they have been told has too much power to come to their front door, break in - take their animals and then have a look around and ruffle through their drawers for nothing?  No one would want that.  And 20 years ago someone told them a really awful story about an SPCA somewhere - so the SPCA really is a piece of shit - and you know the SPCA was all over that problem in Truro a couple weeks ago.

And you know of course the SPCA is really PETA who are trying to end companion animals - really all they want to do is come and steal all your animals.

I have read ALL of these things - FROM CKC members - in the last 24 hours about this proposed act.

If you don't think the CKC are fear mongering and full of paranoia - please, let me sell your a piece of property that I don't actually own.

So if the CKC are lying to you - what is it that they actually want?

Well let me tell you.

I will start this off by saying that I have always been pro responsible breeder - I have fought for responsible breeders with people who are anti-breeder.  But no more - after the things I've read in the last 24 hours from breeders - I am now anti-breeder.

Bodhi was intentionally bred - I love Bodhi - he is the centre of my life - but I will never talk positively about breeders again.

So what do they want?  They want to be able to continue to mutilate their puppies.

In 2009 the Nova Scotia Veterinary Medical Association disallowed their veterinarians from performing unnecessary cosmetic surgeries which included docking tails and cropping ears.  The breeders went crazy but they stuck to their guns - and breeders took their puppies out of province for ears and started docking the tails themselves - and also removed the dew claws themselves.

The NS SPCA tried to charge a few breeders for docking tails - and failed - and it's because of a section of the Animal Protection Act that allows people to perform acts of husbandry - it's section 21(4) of the old Act - and it is completely gone in the new Act.

I wrote a blog post about this called "Legal Loophole for abusing dogs in Nova Scotia"

How do I know that Elaine Gratton is lying about being so concerned about the search and seizure powers of the NS SPCA?  And that what they want is to continue to mutilate their puppies?

All of the search and seizure parts of the proposed act - ARE ALL IN THE OLD ACT.

In fact the new Act is improved in regards to search and seizure for private properties that are not a private dwelling - in the new Act the sections that had talked about if the Inspector does make it inside the house if they see anything they deem to be evidence - they can seize it.  In the new Act there is nowhere that the Inspector or Peace Officer ever gets inside a private dwelling.

So what I am telling you is - you are being lied to by the CKC - the new Animal Protection Act is very good and you should write to your MLA to have it passed - it is a good piece of legislation for animals.

The problem is that animals don't have money - but breeders do - please help our MLA's listen to animals and not breeders!  Take a look at your animal and think to yourself - if they were in distress - who would you want to find them?  An SPCA constable, or a breeder?

So please contact your MLA -  here is a list of all the MLA's in Nova Scotia - and tell them to go through with this Act as written - the parts that everyone is freaking out about are already in the current Act - and the things that have changed are good changes - read the act if you have the time - really read it.  It's good.  Trust me.

And I'd also like to say - the SPCA did not write the legislation - the government did - I worked for the government for 25 years and sat on a lot of policy and procedure committee's - the people who wrote this legislation have nothing to do with the SPCA or PETA or animal welfare - they write policies and procedures - so don't blame the SPCA for this legislation - but I'd like to thank them - it's good legislation - and they listened to the public.  And I hope it passes - despite all the subterfuge that's going on.

When this calms down I'll write the post I wanted to write - about the dog fighting section being added - why? Who knows - and the huge thing about the Animal Welfare Appeal Board meetings being made public - that is an absolutely huge thing that I fought about last year - but I'm not going to talk about it now - what the breeders are trying to do is just too horrible.