Cruelty Archives - Page 6 of 6

Shhh! – Don’t Mention The Pre-planned Deer Cull

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Apr 052011

Planting trees, creating habitats, using trees to clean the air: no one could be against such a plan, particularly if it would be ‘cost neutral’ and the citizens of Aberdeen would wind up with forests to enjoy down the road. However, in light of new information, Voice’s Suzanne Kelly takes a different view.

What probably started out as a good idea is now a contentious web of extremely poor advance planning, politics, blackmail, vandalism and international outcry at a secret, but long-planned deer cull.

It is time to examine what should have happened, what went wrong, and what should and could be done.

The initial scheme

An Aberdeen City news release of 29 October 2010 explains that 210,000 trees will be planted in several stages, that this programme had funding for the first phase, and was winning awards. The news release goes on to explain how important trees are – they will such up pollutants and CO2; they will provide habitat for animals (presumably there should be a tree planting near Loirston Loch, but a stadium is to be planted there instead). This news release, stored on the Council’s website, also explains that funding is being sought for Phase 2.

It is a bit more difficult to find any record on the Council’s website of the deliberate vandalism which destroyed trees planned in Torry and elsewhere. There is no report on how vandals will be prevented from destroying further plantings. But within a month or so of this news release appearing, certain people in the Council involved with the tree scheme were already scheming some destruction of their own – and they certainly didn’t want either you or me to find out about it until it was too late for us to do anything about it. I refer to the plan to keep us in the dark about how Phase 2 of the scheme was being deliberately led: people behind the scheme were actively steering deliberately towards the cull of the Tullos Hill Roe Deer.

Scottish Natural Heritage: A view to a cull

On 25 November 2010 (while citizens were being ‘consulted’ on Phase 2’), Scottish Natural Heritage wrote a letter to a member of the arboreal staff at the Council. (See letter in full below this article). This letter raises a number of serious questions as to how the scheme was handled. The letter certainly seems to be replying to a briefing of some sort. The writer – James Scott of Scottish Natural Heritage’s Wildlife Operations Unit – is addressing issues which should have been made known in the consultation.

At the time of writing, Mr Scott has been informed that someone in Aberdeen Council has already taken several decisions.

an advantage of using contracted deer shooters is that it might distance the Council from the act

Fencing – It has somehow been decided by someone that fencing would be impossible, as there is a public footpath. The UK is covered with such paths and suitable gates are used. Fencing might not have been perfect – but oddly that is part of the blackmail offer the council now proposes.

Deer population – If the fencing controversy is not confusing enough, the letter admits that the number of deer is unknown. How many would be culled is apparently to be decided after SNH personnel visit the site under cover of darkness and make counts. It is not known if such a count has taken place yet, or what the results are. SNH say that tranquilising deer to move them doesn’t work (50% success) and then inexplicably says this would probably be illegal to do. If the law says that killing creatures is better than moving them, then it is time to change the law.

Humane options – the SNH suggest ‘frustrating’ deer – remove gorse, implement other measures, yet our officials rejected these proposals. Again, no recourse to the citizens here.

‘Visual Impact’ of tree protectors they are ruled out – The City told SNH that it would not be using tree protectors on the grounds that they might blow over, creating litter – and because they ‘have visual impact’. The visual impact of something is a personal, not a scientific, issue. It is not sufficient grounds to condemn a population of deer to death.

“there is the issue of reducing available habitat for deer and the fact that we would consequently expect a reduction cull. You have also decided not to use tree guards due to the visual impact and the likelyhood of these being blown away, possibly damaging trees they are meant to protect and creating a littering issue.” – James Scott , SNH

The word ‘deer’ does not get so much as a single use – yet it is now clear that a cull was in the cards

Without any regard to consultation, someone at the City has given this and other reasons leading SNH to conclude the deer should be culled. No one wanted to ask the citizens if we’d rather look at tree protectors (which cost money), or have the trees elsewhere in order to save deer. But the City and SNH were interested in keeping us in the dark….

Keep them in the dark – SNH actually says that an advantage of using contracted deer shooters is that it might distance the Council from the act:

“it may be preferrable to be seen to be doing it in house and have greater control rather than using contractors, or it may be preferable to utilise the distance between instruction and deed that comes from using contractors” – James Scott , SNH

The Aberdeen citizens should also be managed with care – with a ‘robust communication plan:-

“Having visited the site I am content that appropriate deer management can occur in a safe manner. Communicating this to access takers and the wider public may be more of a task which will require a robust communication plan. I would suggest that a suitable deer management plan will help in this regard and I am more than happy to offer assistance in this” – James Scott , SNH

It seems as if the ‘robust communication plan’ is an indication that some people might not like deer shot to save money. If a cull were needed for welfare reasons, a reasonable person might not like the idea, but they would understand. It seems that as no logical reason except cost savings exist for this cull – otherwise there would be no need to keep it out of the consultation or to have a ‘robust communication plan’.

Phase 2 Consultation: No options given

The Consultation which resides on the Aberdeen City Home page gives the reader no idea whatsoever that any of the above plans and processes were in place.
See: http://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk/Consultations/ArchiveConsultations/cst_tree_every_citizen.asp

There is no mention of the vandalism – only of the success of Phase 1. The word ‘deer’ does not get so much as a single use – yet it is now clear that a cull was in the cards. The trees are meant to start ‘making money’ in three years’ time – if there is a plan to turn Tullos into a timber yard, we haven’t been told.

A mix of private and public money is paying for this. Public money is your money and mine – this makes it doubly scandalous that the City chose to deliberately hide mention of the deer cull. We missed our chance to object to the consultation because of this omission – and as the petitions circulating attest – there are thousands of people who would have liked to have had the choice.

Questions for the Council

It is up to the Council – In particular, Aileen Malone, The Housing and Environment Committee, and whoever else was involved in the details of the Tree Planting scheme – to supply answers to a few questions arising:-

Who made the decision to leave any deer cull out of the public consultation?
Who took the decision that non-lethal measures would be discounted and then communicated to SNH?
Who precisely decided to plant the trees on Tullos Hill, and why wasn’t the deer population immediately identified as a reason to find another location?
Who decided tree guards’ visual impact was preferable to a deer cull?
Whose aesthetic judgment decided the tree guards were unattractive?
How many trees were vandalised in Phase 1?
How much public money was spent in Phase 1, and how much is planned to be spent in Phase 2?
Was a consultation with Torry Community Council taken, and if so, were the deer discussed?
How many deer were counted by SNH, and how many are to be culled?

Rays of hope

Thankfully animal activists, citizens of Aberdeen and people around the globe have become involved in campaigns and petition creating to stop this senseless slaughter. Concerned people should contact their local Community Council members, the Housing and Environment Committee, Committee convener Aileen Malone, and other elected representatives to ask for answers to these questions, and to demand an inquiry into the consultation’s management, and to request a new, honest one.

A civilised government would want to put any cull on indefinite hold until this affair is cleared up. Deer should not be slaughtered because people in government don’t want to spend money – and given the involved Councillors’ amazing ultimatum: raise funds for fencing, or we shoot animals – is it time for some changes in their number?

– Letter from James Scott ( SNH ) to Richard Nicholson ( ACC ).

– Further reading: Critical Society quarterly e-journal.

Dog-fighting – No Room For Complacency In Aberdeen

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Featured, Information Comments Off

Feb 252011

By Suzanne Kelly.

Rescued dog scarred from being forced to fight

The Council said organised dog-fighting is not happening here (at least they put that in writing to me a few years back).
The Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the BBC and the police are not so sure. Back in 2007 there was an allegation that men were deliberately hunting the streets of Aberdeen with Staffordshire type dogs, looking for cats for the dogs to attack.

There was the recent incident in Seaton where a pet cat was held down by two men so a dog could savage it. Unfortunately, the police don’t seem to have found anyone for this crime yet.

Dog-fighting equipment and dogs were found in several areas north of Aberdeen not long ago as well. Two swans were recently found badly injured near Bridge of Dee (they are recovering), and on 14 February a swan was found in this same area – dismembered. While this last crime (injuring wild animals is a criminal offense) must have been done by a person, it was in the same general area that the dog-injured birds were found. Given these incidents it seems we do have a problem. The problem can be solved if people come forward and let the authorities know (anonymously if they wish) who is involved.

It is bad enough that there is such a visible increase in the number of dogs which could be classified as ‘pit bull cross breeds’ or ‘fighting type dogs’ under the Dangerous Dogs Act. In addition, many of the dogs in the ‘dangerous’ category which we see on the street are not on a lead and a few seem to be owned by people who are simply not interested in the dog’s welfare. The Dangerous Dogs Act was intended in part to counteract the proliferation of types of animals which were frequently involved in incidents where people were injured.

The psychological makeup of the people involved in dog fighting makes them a danger not just to animals, but to people as well

A dog ring in England was broken up not long ago; the dogs were trained to exhaustion, given live cats and other animals to tear to shreds alive and were made to fight in a pit in a woman’s back garden.

Dog-fight attendees are known to film the dogs torturing cats on mobile phones – the purpose of the cats is to rile the dogs up to fight.

If the dogs would not fight (and frankly, any well-treated dog does not normally want to attack another animal), they were tortured with electric shocks. In one case which involved nationals of several European countries, an English woman in was eventually jailed and fined. Dog-fighting is (obviously) illegal, and penalties include jail and fines – but some say the existing law is not strong enough.

The psychological makeup of the people involved in dog fighting makes them a danger not just to animals, but to people as well. They are detached from suffering, concerned only with money the dogs earn for them; have abnormal emotional development that make the fights seem ‘thrilling’ and such people are completely ‘beyond the pale’ of what is acceptable behaviour. Getting these people identified, and hopefully convicted will make animals as well as people safer.

The Dangerous Dogs Act saw four types of animal outlawed – but there are now so many cross breeds, it is virtually outdated to say that the fighting is limited to any one breed at all. As far as breeding goes, a bitch will be bred constantly to produce puppies, kept in complete confinement. One day the exhausted bitch will be so weakened that she and her last litter will be killed, and another bitch takes her place.

Rescued from dogfighting ring - only to be euthanised as rehabilitation is deemed impossible.

This ‘killer instinct’ is drilled into the pups from their first hours.

They are treated with great cruelty, forced into gruelling exercise regimes (which kills some of them in the process), beaten, starved, tortured and ‘rewarded’ by being given live animals to maul.

There is absolutely no place for dog-fighting or for anyone involved in this inhumane, illegal crime in a civilised society.

It is important to remember that even well-treated dogs have ‘turned’ – and attacked, mauled, and killed people – and statistics for these types of attacks are rising year on year. Dogs that have been treated cruelly to deliberately make them vicious are a serious threat to everyone’s safety.

A massive raid in 2007 in Merseyside saw twenty-eight dogs rescued from this fighting culture, and dozens or arrests, brought about by the public confidentially contacting police and animal welfare organisations.

When to call the authorities:

Do you see any dogs bearing obvious scarring?
Are dogs, cats or other small animals in your neighbourhood disappearing?
Do you hear the sounds of animals in pain?
Neighbours acting suspiciously and keeping either dangerous dogs or large amounts of dogs?
Has a neighbour with a dangerous dog suddenly not own the dog any longer?
Suspect something however tenuous?

Scottish SPCA Chief Superintendent Mike Flynn said:

“We believe that any dog, regardless of its breed, can be made aggressive through an owner’s lack of training or through deliberate encouragement of bad behaviour.

“The breeding, trading and owning of a dog banned under the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 is not only extremely irresponsible and reckless but is also a criminal offence. Anyone caught doing so can expect to face prosecution and a court may order the destruction of the dog.

“We rely on members of the public contacting us as soon as they become aware of any information relating to dog fighting and urge them to contact our animal helpline on 03000 999 999. We can assure people that all calls are dealt with in strictest confidence and information can be left anonymously.”

Just to get the message home: anyone with information or with any possible tips – however large or small about animal cruelty should call the SSPCA animal helpline on 03000 999 999. You don’t have to give your details and any information just might stop animal cruelty.

Old Susannah’s Dictionary No.17

Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, Articles, Creative Writing, Opinion, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Dec 192010

Voice’s Old Susannah tackles more tricky terms with a locally topical taste.

The new cuts are well and truly underway. Aberdeen City council met on Wednesday Dec15 and voted to get cracking on the ‘green lighted’ budget cuts, and the rest will follow as night follows day. Old Susannah is certain this round of cuts will bring as much economic stability and prosperity as the last round of budget cuts did.

Cuts are always hard, but are especially unwelcome at this festive time of year. Please then pause to spare a thought for the forgotten victims of these hard times who have been hit hard. I am of course referring to the City Council officials who this year will not be reimbursed for printing their own Christmas cards to send to friends and constituents. Yes, it’s true – you might not get a card this year showing your councillor, their family and the family pet by a fireplace in full technicolour glory, sincerely wishing you and your family the best for 2011. Quite rightly, some of the councillors have complained that this is a cut too far.

Nothing brought quite as much cheer as a Christmas card showing your happy councillor, except perhaps knowing that your tax money helped to pay for it. There is only so much a hardworking councillor can pay for out of their meagre salaries, so if anyone from Future Choices or the Cyrenians is reading this (or anyone else who feels this cut is unfair), please send your councillor a pound or two. Thank you.

By popular demand Old Susannah has been trying to follow up on various animal cruelty stories previously covered in these pages. Our friend the fox batterer, Donald Forbes, is due in the courts early in 2011; he went back on his original confession to clubbing the fox. He then said he was in mortal danger, and merely swung the club near the fox. Now he’s saying nothing. It remains a mystery how the fox was so badly injured it needed to be put down just from having a club swung near it. Maybe Forbes is not a very good golfer.

Coventry’s Mary Bale still can’t explain why she put a cat into a wheelie bin and left it there for some 15 hours

Seagull – shooting Mervyn New of Marine Subsea is making no comment either. Yours truly sent an email to his company and its head office in Norway (asking about its’ guns at work’ policy); both resulted in ‘delivery failure’ messages. I will call them again soon – no doubt they will want to explain why people run around their offices shooting animals.

It’s understood Mr New faces a charge under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. He could also face a charge alleging the reckless discharge of a firearm. It’s really a sad day when a man can’t shoot bird chicks from his office window; whatever are we coming to? Finally, Coventry’s Mary Bale still can’t explain why she put a cat into a wheelie bin and left it there for some 15 hours. We are meant to have some sympathy for her – her father was critically ill. Personally, I find that sending flowers or making soup for the ill person is usually more beneficial to them than the cat-in-the-bin method.

Committee: A committee is a group formed with common goals to promote a certain activity and/or result. It is also said that ‘A camel is a horse designed by a committee’. The reason Aberdeen runs as well as it does is its structure of committees. There are about 20 of these highly efficient committees, and countless sub-committees and action groups under them. Some of these groups of dedicated, far-seeing professionals include the ‘Audit and Risk’, ‘Development Management’, and ‘Corporate Policy’ and ‘Performance ‘ committees. There is an ‘Urgent Business’ committee as well.

We might be about 70 million pounds out of budget, but we do have time, money and resources for a ‘taxi consultation group’. Then again, with the money spent by Kate Dean alone on taxis, it’s probably a good idea this group exists. One of my sources confirms that we are still frequently sending taxis instead of using buses to transport school children and adult groups where buses would be far more economical. I am surprised – I thought most adult groups had been done away with.

Kate Dean is such a genius; her diverse talents enable her to successfully do a host of diverse jobs at one time

It is good that we have a Disability Advisory Group. The best advice I can think of for someone with special needs would be to move to somewhere that won’t slash its disability budget, or at least will clear the pavements in winter so you can leave your home. (PS – do bear in mind that ‘Future Choices’ replaced ‘Choices’ which the Council axed. They could, I’m sure, use a donation or two).

But clearly it is the Audit and Risk Management team that we all owe so much to. We could be in an awful mess if we didn’t have people looking after our budget. Risk managers must have been quite busy ensuring the City resolved its equal pay problems so successfully and swiftly. And when one arm of the city council took another branch to court recently over a housing/services dispute – spending yet more taxpayer money in the process, it was great to know that risk managers somewhere made sure the City didn’t waste money or look like a laughing stock.

Old Susannah will have a look at these wonderful committees in more depth soon.

Diversity, Diversification: Diversity refers to a condition of being composed of different elements. Leonardo daVinci was a genius with a wide ranging diversity of talents – sculptor, designer, painter, scientist. It is often said that we have not seen his like again, but in Aberdeen we have our own example. Our very own Kate Dean is such a genius; her diverse talents enable her to successfully do a host of diverse jobs at one time. She was leader of our Council before becoming head of Planning, and it is clear for all to see what talent she’s brought to those roles. But our Kate finds that her role as councillor and head of planning leave enough free time for various Board of Director roles.

The state of Grampian NHS can be attributed to Ms Dean’s presence on the Board. She was, of course, also on the Board of the successful AECC. Of course a few million pounds were needed to keep the AECC afloat, and the auditors prepared a damning report (which the Council had to discuss in secret this week). And the NHS locally may be in a bleak condition, fighting superbugs and parasites, but this could happen to anyone. It is clear that without Kate Dean having such diverse talents and skills, we would not be where we are today. Let’s give thanks where it is due.

In the old days, a worker or a company had to diversify to stay with the times. You don’t see to many coopers and blacksmiths in town these days. The camera and photographic supply giant Kodak saw the digitial age coming and immediately embraced it. They changed their business model from concentrating on making film-producing cameras and supplies to become an online giant for digital products.

However, we don’t want to have to make everyone diversify. Every week there are glaring headlines pertaining to the nuclear industry and the new home building trade screaming ‘JOB LOSSES COMING. Naturally we don’t ever want to stop making nuclear weapons – someone might lose a job. And as long as there are green fields we can build on, let’s not make the builders diversify into any other lines of work. This should be self evident.

Animal Cruelty – Are We Hypocrites?

Articles, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Oct 222010

By Robert Johnson.

Last week the Aberdeen local papers were up in arms about a story of a couple of men who held down a pet cat so their pitbull could savage him. It is very difficult to find justification for such an event, as it is two individuals gaining pleasure from the unnecessary suffering of another sentient individual (regardless of which species that individual is from).

Depending on which source you read, the story obviously provoked a different type of outrage – and there are very few who wouldn’t be on the side of such a response.

But why? Well, it’s two men getting nothing but pleasure from a vast amount of suffering and we don’t need to go around torturing cats to enjoy our lives. If we did, I wouldn’t be the only one advocating we find pleasure elsewhere – people being socialized to gratify themselves from the infliction of suffering is something society is better off without, for a host of reasons.

Perhaps a more relevant question is why we are horrified by this event in particular? The animals tortured to produce our meat, dairy and eggs, leather, fur and cosmetics (etc) are treated every bit as badly as the cat in question. Cows have their calves torn from them and are continually forcefully inseminated, most male chickens are gassed or shredded at birth – and moreover every single one of these individuals will die in the process, or necessarily be murdered at a young age in a cold slaughterhouse for our pleasures. All the while our best response is a ‘humane treatment’ stamp every now and again, which will do nothing but ensure they can flap their wings or breathe fresh air occasionally. Why are we not quite so distressed by this?

My critics first response will be that, for the cat, the suffering was unnecessary. The two men were gaining only sadistic pleasure from watching the cat be torn apart by their beloved fighting dog. In doing so the assumption is made that the tastes for animal foods and other products is somehow necessary. But this is where we err.

There is no moral difference between demanding a cat be torn apart for your pleasure, or that of a cow and if both are unnecessary, then they are equally wrong.

A human being has no more need for cows’ milk than it does for dog, giraffe or horse milk – we drank it in times when food was presumably scarce and no longer need to in a world where we have rich varieties of foods available. We got calcium, before dairy products, in places like green vegetables, nuts and beans – and such places are still the healthiest sources for a mammal who is not meant to drink the milk of another species, or any milk at all after being weaned.

We don’t need animal flesh either. Again, this is a remnant of a time gone by when we needed to kill to eat. You could eat nothing but potatoes and still not be ‘protein deficient’ (such is the myth about protein – there has never been a single case of ‘protein deficiency’ where someone was not starving), but nevertheless you can get more protein as a ratio from soya beans than you can from beef. Iron – again, try vegetables, beans, nuts…

What I’m trying to say is that eating animal foods is not at all necessary, and so buying animal products means causing unnecessary suffering. There is no moral difference between demanding a cat be torn apart for your pleasure, or that of a cow and if both are unnecessary, then they are equally wrong. This is true, regardless of the excuse that we have done this for years, or that everyone does it – had we been using pitbulls to tear cats apart from years, or if everyone else did it, it would still be morally abhorrent.

You won’t hear the big ‘animal protection’ groups saying this. They are all too happy to jump on bandwagons with public outrage in the hope you will donate money to them. If you were disgusted by the story of the two men’s behavior, rather than support an animal welfare cause, or simply support their incarceration, your first step should be to stop indulging in the behavior yourself. Just because the cow, chicken, fish or pig you eat this evening didn’t have her torture detailed on the front page of the P&J, it doesn’t change a thing. The first step of the person disgusted with unnecessary suffering is to go vegan – and it’s a step that is very easy to take in the modern world.
For more information on veganism and becoming vegan, please visit www.veganuk.net, or the GrampianARA’s ‘Vegan Guide to Aberdeen’

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