Yesterday the government of Wales published the long-awaited document reviewing submissions of comments (“consultations”) by the public. Remarks were submitted by 458 agencies, organizations and individuals in the open period from 19 February – 17 May 2019.
The results are quite as expected. Near unanimous support with a few eye-rollers: the typical fatuous argument that a ban won’t completely end the industry so why bother to do anything at all.
Blue Cross, an animal rescue and rehoming agency active in Wales, Scotland and England since 1897, had this to say:
We don’t agree that just introducing a ban on thirdparty sellers will have any impact on those sellers that make large profits and choose to operate outside the licensing regime. We believe that before introducing a potentially knee jerk piece of legislation, the government must assess the scale of the third party trade in puppies and the impact any such ban would have on licensed large scale breeders.
Blue Cross submission to the Gov’t of Wales Call for Consultation on ending third party sales of dogs and cats.
Emphasis ours.
They go on about stricter regulations being the best course. We in the ‘States know this strategy simply does not work as most governments are unwilling to put additional staffing and revenue/expense burdens on those budgets already stretched, which the route of strong restrictions causes en masse.
New York City is a showcase for this. NYC’s strong restrictions of dog and cat retail sales have proven near-completely unenforceable and sales go on largely unchecked, while their outright ban of rabbit sales has put a stopper on the rabbit overpopulation problem by directly ending impulse purchases in pet stores.
The English ban is set for enforcement on 1 April 2020. The law was deemed Lucy’s Law after news about a spaniel in a typical puppy mill horror situation achieved viral status in the UK. Lucy was imprisoned in a puppy mill in Wales.
Welsh activists have called on their government to “beat the English to it.” With Lucy’s Law laid in the spring of this year the Welsh government would have to move swiftly, mandating enforcement in less than 8 months, to win the race of taking this critical step in ending animal cruelty in the British Isles.
Either way, England and Wales are now the de facto model to the world of how a countrywide ban can be enacted through the determination of activists to bring about change.
End the suffering.