INSPECTOR SAYS RSPCA IS COMPROMISED

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<http://www.care2.com/news/member/374874447/581085> INSPECTOR SAYS RSPCA IS

COMPROMISED - NARESH

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A SENIOR RSPCA inspector says the integrity and independence of the

organisation is being compromised because of lobbying by billion-dollar

rural industries.

 

North-West Inspector Frank Bingham, whose new book is based on his 17 years

in the inspectorate, said it would be the height of naivety to believe there

had not been lobbying by vested interests at a ministerial level or

subsequent pressure on the RSPCA to curtail its activities.

 

Mr Bingham said a prime example was the RSPCA investigation into Woolnorth,

a dairy farming operation at Tasmania's Circular Head, where many starving

cows and calves were found in 2004.

 

" I have no doubt people with vested interests were lobbying to minimise our

impact in the dairy industry at that time, " he said.

 

" In terms of sheer numbers, and we were never able to count the number of

carcasses, Woolnorth was the worst case I have investigated.

 

" Yet only a handful of the more than 100 charges against them made it to the

court system. "

 

As a result of those charges, three Woolnorth employees were fined a total

of $11,000.

 

Mr Bingham said while operations at Woolnorth were now impressive, the

changes had resulted from negative publicity rather than from court or RSPCA

action.

 

" The dairy industry in Tasmania is now looking good but we have to be

constantly vigilant to ensure it doesn't go backwards. "

 

Mr Bingham said the biggest threat to animal welfare in Tasmania was public

indifference.

 

" Tasmanians have their heads in the sand and don't want to believe animal

cruelty is happening under their noses and is on the rise. "

 

Mr Bingham said since July cruelty complaints in the North-West had

escalated from an average of 40 calls a month to 90 a month and resulted in

the appointment of a second North-West inspector.

 

He said similar increases had been experienced around the state.

 

" This community is deluding itself that this is a problem that happens

somewhere else despite the RSPCA investigating 2000 cases every year. " Mr

Bingham said he and the state's other RSPCA inspectors were constantly being

worn down by the acts of cruelty they investigated and the public's apparent

indifference to them.

 

" We are fed up with the lies, verbal abuse and death threats from scum who

enjoy the full protection of the law, " he said.

 

" We are fed up with the network of spineless bureaucrats who pay lip-service

to animal welfare while protecting their own petty empires by scheming and

pimping for their masters higher up the political food chain.

 

" We are fed up with the growing leniency in courts where the outright lie or

the traumatised childhood carries more weight than forensic fact. "

 

Mr Bingham said while the penalties were adequate, with jail terms and fines

of up to $20,000, the courts did not apply them.

 

" The harshest penalty I can remember the court handing down was a $3000 fine

imposed on a person who almost starved a dog to death.

 

" The courts are not acting because the snivel-libertarians have sold us all

down the drain.

 

" The problem of animal cruelty is escalating and includes acts which plumb

new depths of depravity yet at the same time there has been a corresponding

decrease in the penalties handed out for these offences.

 

" Tasmania's animals deserve better. "

 

--

Naresh Kadyan <www.pfaharyana.in>,

Convener International PFA / SPCA & Chairman.

Mobile : 09813010595