CONTROL OF GUARD DOGS (Hansard, 11 July 1975)

§ Mr. Peter Doig (Dundee, West)
I beg to move, That the House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
I would like to express my thanks to Lord Gordon-Walker and Earl Cowley for the way they handled this Bill in another place. I was invited to attend a meeting between the supporters of the Bill and objectors, and we worked out amendments which satisfied the objections as far as possible without destroying the intentions of the Bill. This is a very sensible way to deal with the matter, and it expedited the Bill's progress in another place. Considering their background and the way in which they were arrived at, it is not surprising that I agree with all 13 of the Lords amendments.
Lords Amendment No. 1 makes clear that the primary object of Clause 1 is that owners must ensure that dogs are under the control of the handler at all times while being used as guard dogs. There will be occasions when the handler will not be able to have the dog udder control—for example, when he is cooking a meal. The amendment makes clear that securing the dog on these occasions is the exception to the general rule.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. George Thomas)
With this, we can discuss Lords Amendment No. 3, in page 1, line 16, leave out "chained up or otherwise".

§ Mr. Doig
I beg to move, That the House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
It was thought inappropriate to prescribe in the Bill how a dog should be secured. With the amendment, the clause will require that a dog should be secured 977 so that it is not at liberty to go freely about the premises, but leaves it to the handler to decide the best way of securing the dog. He might feel it should be securely kennelled. Whatever he does to secure a dog, if it is at liberty to go freely about the premises the handler will be contravening the clause. The amendment removes the part of the clause which specified that a dog had to be chained up.

§ Mr. Carol Mather (Esher)
Although I missed one of the important stages of this Bill, I was here when it started its passage through Parliament. It is now a very different and better Bill. I support the amendment because there was the danger of ill treatment of dogs and the fact that they had to be chained up.