Hugh J. Wirth AM BVSc FAVA
President RSPCA Australia
May 2000

Introduction

From the earliest of times humans have kept animals as pets. A fascination with other living creatures and a desire to possess them remain to this day the underlying reasons for humans to keep pets.

It was soon discovered that some wild animal species could be tamed and made dependent. The dog was the first animal tamed and became not only useful in a variety of ways such as helping humans hunt for food and protecting them from predator humans and other animals but a companion. Today, across the wide spectrum of human cultures, the dog remains the only animal whose relationship with humans is one of almost total dependence.

The cat also has qualities that continue to fascinate humans but those same qualities have never allowed it to become more than a semi-dependent animal. The aloofness of the cat and its refusal to be dominated by humans are the reasons cats are both popular pets and yet are detested and disregarded by so many.

Despite the ease with which birds can be tamed they have never developed any form of dependence on humans except when made captive. Another popular pet, the fish, has never been capable of being tamed, nor of developing dependence except as a captive animal. Perhaps it is for this reason that both species, although kept in large numbers as pets, have never captured the widespread community support enjoyed by dogs.

Throughout the world many other animals, both domestic and wild, are kept as companion animals. In many cases it is not readily apparent what qualities these animals possess which would make them ideal pets. Perhaps the answer simply lies in the eternal need for humans to be seen to differ from each other in their lifestyle choices and their need to dominate.

Significant Events of the 20th Century effecting pet keeping

In the early years of the 20th century stray domestic dogs had reached nuisance proportions in many countries. Shelters were established by animal welfare societies to care for these stray animals and to attempt to rehouse many of them. Establishment of shelters was not a traditional objective of these societies, but the prevention of the cruelty suffered by stray dogs certainly was. 

Eventually the need to set statuary conditions on the ownership and keeping of dogs resulted in the passage of dog control legislation by governments. These Acts gave legal recognition to the dog which in turn permitted its control via registration, legal seizure and impounding and, where necessary, destruction. No attempt was made at that time to bring the cat under control by legislation.

Perhaps as a result of the huge upheaval of the Second World War, the western world witnessed the slow erosion of the traditional extended human family and saw it replaced by much smaller family units and people living alone or in other circumstances certain to cause isolation, alienation or loneliness. As a result, family life was judged in some societies to be incomplete without pet ownership, while other humans found that owning a pet provided a very real antidote to loneliness.

By the early 1970's the animal welfare movement on several continents convened a number of search conferences which greatly enhanced the awareness of why modern humans considered pet ownership to be an essential part of their lifestyle and why those same people regularly dumped their pets with all of the cruel consequences to these animals. This led to a greater appreciation of the human-companion animal bond, the concept of Responsible Pet Ownership and the development of modern humane education programs for companion animals.

These conferences, however, did not lead to any deep understanding of why even the most irresponsible, negligent people own animals, mismanage them, dump them and obtain replacements only to repeat the most unfortunate cycle. There seems, even with the most inappropriate people, an urge to own/possess animals maybe just to have something they can master or kick around.

During the 1980's scientific research on companion animal projects successfully qualified and quantified the human-companion animal bond. The overwhelming conclusion to this work is that pet keeping significantly assists humans maintain physical and mental health.

Finally, the end of the century saw a review of existing dog control legislation by some jurisdictions to strengthen the requirements of identification and registration, the control of nuisance and other rules of ownership, and the disposal of dogs. And for the first time these provisions were extended to include cats, where feline behaviour permitted, with the unique additional management tool of night curfew.

In terms of animal welfare the 20th century closed on much the same note as that of the 19th century. Even in the most enlightened societies many animal welfare problems exist due to a confounding political and bureaucratic indifference. Our leaders may well be consumed with human welfare and management problems but they are clearly ignorant of or misunderstand the very real link between compassion for animals and behaviour within the community generally and the human-companion animal bond. William Wilberforce and his supporters and the founders of the animal welfare movement on all continents understood this link only to well. It is incumbent on all of us who now direct or support this movement to re-embrace this philosophy and campaign more strongly in the 21st century for its adoption by all cultures.

The forces shaping pet keeping in the 21st Century

The pace of change associated with human life in developed and developing countries will continue to accelerate. Human fear of, and resistance to, change is responsible for much of the feeling of alienation and hopelessness that characterises modern life. It is therefore easy to predict that the antidote to loneliness, the keeping of a companion animal, will, in a word, be even more compelling in the 21st century.

In the western world there is a very marked trend to single person households. This is predicted to escalate in the first few decades of this century and will have a big effect on pet ownership particularly as single people need company and animals will often adequately provide it. As well, we are an ageing society and the huge significance of pet ownership for the elderly may finally be understood and accommodated under town planning guidelines.

As Asian societies have benefited from economic growth and affluence, their urban communities have discovered the value of companion animals. The reasons for this are precisely the same as experienced in western societies. The major difference is that the infrastructure needed to support responsible pet ownership in Asian countries is currently inadequate, if not absent.

By contrast, in poorer developing countries and within indigenous communities growth in pet ownership will be very much slower with dogs, usually poorly cared for, being highly valued in a traditional hunting sense rather than as pets. From this can be deduced that affluence and the circumstances of individual lifestyle largely dictates whether the ownership of animals as pets is embraced widely within a particular culture.

Consequences of increasing Companion Animal Ownership

As Asian communities and those from developing countries are attracted to ownership of animals as pets there may well be a hiatus as they transfer customary animal use/management to the more complicated and emotional companion status. For some societies this will be a dramatic cultural change from regarding animals as having no intrinsic value other than for work or status to the appreciation of them as sentient creatures requiring respect and a duty of care.

Many people new to pet owning will have little, if any, background in the husbandry of the animal of their choice. They will often be unaware of the basic principles of animal care, of animal behaviour and of animal needs and welfare. It will take time for such societies to absorb the full impact of owning animals purely as pets and laws and management systems will take time to meet the new phenomenon.

Who will look after the animals made victims by these circumstances?

In western cultures too, the steady drift to intensive urban living will also mean that many people new to pet owning will lack the basic background in the husbandry and behaviour of the animal they choose as a pet. The effects of modern urban lifestyle on pets and the ability of pet owners to provide an adequate environment for them have yet to be properly understood and addressed. People are likely to be working longer hours in a style differing greatly from that of their parents. Recreational lifestyle choices will also differ, sometimes quite radically, leading to pets being left for even longer periods on their own. Living space will be increasingly restricted, including restrictions on animal access to public open space. These are just some of the important factors which will impact on companion animal ownership early this century.

Already the appearance in several societies of a vocal and active movement intolerant of companion animals has led to the realisation by governments, local governments and animal welfare societies that they must become much smarter in managing companion animals. These people demand that unwanted, ill-disciplined, badly behaved dogs and cats not intrude upon their amenity. They will not tolerate these intrusions and will demand whole areas be declared "animal free" and accept only draconian control legislation. This will include a demand that people owning dogs and cats be first tested and approved so that owning a companion animal will be a privilege, not a right.

The animal welfare movement must engage central and local government authorities intelligently to ensure that laws encouraging the proper control of dogs and cats are reasonably well enforced, and that amenity is comfortably shared by pet-owners and non-owners alike. These diverse requirements can be comfortably accommodated through sensible use of available public space but must be dealt with sooner rather than later.

How the animal welfare movement reacts to these required changes and how it provides intelligent leadership via the provision of supportable solutions will largely dictate outcomes for companion animals in the 21st century. Are we, the inheritors of the philosophy of animal welfare first enunciated by William Wilberforce, Richard Martin and Arthur Broome, ready to meet this challenge?

The Animal Welfare movement and Companion Animal Ownership

Since the organised animal welfare movement began 176 years ago, it has justifiably condemned the mismanagement of companion animals and the indifference displayed by governments of all political persuasions to the needs and rights of animals. This movement, long perceived as of secondary importance and/or controlled by strange people with ill-conceived ideas, has, in many countries during the 20th century, learnt that unless it acquired considerable political influence it will remain sidelined despite occupying the high moral ground. Its influence has been psychological, the pricking of consciences and the urging of compassion on lawmakers and the community at large.

Yet divisions within the animal welfare movement are often quite counter-productive. For example, while the principles of responsible pet ownership are agreed, particularly amongst active "hands-on" shelter societies, there is widespread disagreement on how these principles should be achieved. Failure to agree is too often fuelled by anthropomorphism and ignoring common sense, practicality, the objectives of animal welfare societies, advances made in the knowledge of animal health and behaviour and animal welfare science. Governments and the bureaucracies will readily exploit division in order to delay or prevent progress despite the fact that often the community agrees and even demands such progress.

As a result, those communities which aspire to high animal welfare standards will no longer tolerate those animal welfare societies which on the one hand demand the adoption by government of the principles of responsible management of companion animals yet on the other fail to manage their own shelter systems in accordance with those principles. The early years of the 21st century require all animal welfare societies to engage in national and international debate on the complex goals of the animal welfare movement and how best they might now be achieved.

A Charter for Companion Animal Management in the early 21st Century

Controlling companion animal welfare problems at their source

For too long there has been little challenge to the belief that pet ownership is a right even when it is undertaken with virtually no accountability or done irresponsibly. This attitude, held by a substantial element of the community, permits and/or exacerbates companion animals to be bred in excessive numbers, quite unsuitable species taken from the wild to be kept as pets, companion animal control laws to fail to solve modern problems associated with pet ownership and the disposal by killing of unwanted pet animals in ever increasing numbers.

Animal welfare societies were founded to prevent cruelty to animals by procuring the passage of contemporary legislation for their protection and ensuring such legislation is enforced and to sustain an intelligent public opinion regarding animal welfare. These societies were certainly not founded to be the general community depositary and disposal unit for unwanted animals. While animal welfare societies have readily shouldered the huge psychological and financial burdens of conducting shelters for unwanted animals, the truth is that governments and the communities they serve have consequently escaped responsibility for companion animal management.

The animal welfare movement must now demand that only sufficient numbers of suitable and sound companion animals to meet community requirements are bred; that control laws address all of the principles of responsible pet ownership; and that disposal of unwanted animals includes rehousing programs as the top priority with humane killing as a last resort.

Requirements for Companion Animal management laws

• Companion Animal Management laws must include provisions for cats as well as dogs.
• People wishing to own a companion animal must, before proceeding to purchase an animal, be licensed as having adequate knowledge of the requirements of responsible pet ownership and animal care.
• All animals must be registered with local authorities to identify their owners as well as assist with their return should owner and pet become separated.
• All pet animals must be permanently identified by microchip with a national register established recording ownership details.
• Those acquiring a pet animal (that is, not for breeding) must be supplied with a veterinary health certificate covering soundness, current health status and vaccination history. The animal must be already desexed, both male and female. Rehoused animals must have passed a nationally accredited temperament test. All companion animals must be able to be returned to the supplier free of all obligations should it be found to be unsuitable for any reason within the first fourteen days of ownership.
• The law must include a financial reward for desexed companion animals, both male and female, via substantial lowering of animal registration fees. 
• Procedures to enable any person to gain relief from, and compensation for, companion animal nuisance must be clearly understandable and accessible.
• There must be particular provisions for the control of dangerous dogs based on the principle of deed not breed.
• All companion animal businesses providing services for pet animals such asreeders/suppliers, trainers, pet shops, boarding facilities, pounds and shelters, must be registered and operate in accordance with minimum standards established via regulated Codes of Practice. These standards must include all accepted veterinary and management principles that will ensure the health and welfare of pet animals. 
• Companion animals subject to legal seizure must be confined in a public pound, or in an animal welfare shelter acting as a pound, and the rights of the confined animal and the owner must be respected. A companion animal pound or shelter is in fact an intensive animal house and all relevant veterinary procedures must be observed. Owners must be able to gain access to the facility at reasonably convenient times on a daily basis. An animal that is not badly injured or diseased must be held for a minimum of eight days before any decision on rehousing or euthanasia is made. The eight-day period should be employed to prepare the animal for rehousing should it not be reclaimed by the owner.
• The law must be structured to ensure that the companion animal owner is fully accountable for all breaches.
  Humane Education

Humane education programs are mostly based on providing correct advice on selecting a suitable companion animal and the requirements of proper animal ownership. Most pet owners know little of animal behaviour, yet an understanding of this is often a major factor in resolving many animal ownership problems. Humane education programs should include animal behaviour matters, must be funded by government and should concentrate long term on responsible ownership/management courses in schools.

Conclusion

It was William Wilberforce who first taught us that animals have an intrinsic value of their own and, accordingly, must be considered to possess the right to live in a manner which enables them to have a positive life and to develop and enjoy their inherent qualities. To achieve this we must accept that we owe a duty of care to animals merited by the nature of the animal as a sentient creature capable of responding to human care and attention. The Five Freedoms for Animals details the essential points of that duty of care owed to animals and these must be delivered with sympathy, consideration, compassion and tenderness.

We live in a world where companion animals are becoming even more relevant and important to more and more people. It is also a world which is often hostile to dogs and cats because of human ignorance of their behavioural, health and welfare needs and problems which arise from the maintenance of the rights of pet owners and non-pet owners alike.

The animal welfare movement has strived to have acceptable standards of treatment and husbandry of animals underpinned by the enactment and enforcement of laws, regulations and codes to protect them from exploitation. While we all resent being subjected to over-regulation, the truth is that companion animal legislation and enforcement has always lagged as governments have not considered it relevant or necessary. We must now become united in our views and be swift and precise in our efforts to have universal pet management laws adopted in the next few decades.

These laws must not only elevate the status of pet ownership but acknowledge the role of companion animals in our communities and the need to manage them responsibly. They must also take management and responsibility squarely to the dog and cat breeding industry, including backyard breeders, and all of those who profit from pet ownership.