Ireland's Animal Welfare Crisis and Resolution

Update on the dog shelter. A considerable amount of information is coming to light about the successful tenderers for the Carlow Kilkenny Dog Shelter, Four Seasons Promotions, trading as acs. Even whole groups have been working on this for months, in respect to horse welfare. I have been asked if we should have a private group so as not to be defamatory. My position on this is: If you have any documents or any concern, even if not yet verified, send it to kevin.hanley@kilkennycoco.ie. He's in the Procurement Department and maybe Cllr Breda Gardner too. The wording could be, 'I heard …' or 'I attach a link, that I came across, to …'.and 'Please would you make absolutely sure there is no truth in it before awarding the tender.' Ask also that they lodge a record of your concern as having been received within the 16 day standstill period. If you do this, those that are being asked to revise their decision cannot say that they did not know. They will have all the information we have. So, please, send everything you've got to the council. This passes the onus of Protecting Pound Dogs Kilkenny/Carlow back to them. And most importantly, the information living in our own inboxes will break our hearts.

The council have defiantly said that we can take legal action but I am sure that all this information you have painstakingly gathered will never be heard unless you lodge it now, while there is a national spotlight on a specific tender, while the council's very own 16 day standstill period is in place and before the money is awarded. This is an opportunity for complete transparency and an opportunity to insist on the council doing the right thing. I have also contacted Transparency International so I don't think that the council or the animal collection service will want that amount of investigation. Send on everything you've got, thoughts, feelings, documents, solutions, accusations, let it all out..but make sure its on the record and make sure you have your qualifying statements in, like ''this might not all be true but I am sure the council would want to know if there was any risk that it were!!'' - This statement even gives the council credit for wanting to know and gratitude for their willingness to address the situation. Maybe, this way we can make it happen!!

My most recent broadcast on the dog pound tender process can be heard at 

Dog Tender Podcast

Don't let the Animal Collection agency, who deal in dead animals get the Dog Shelter. Letter to cut and paste or compose one of your own

This is pretty much the letter I sent as objection to the Kilkenny Council's handling of the allocation of the tender for the Dog Shelter! Please feel free to add that two 'popular' groups so including Healing by Franc and the charity A.S.H would be much preferred. I didn't know that they had, too, put in a tender when I sent the following letter! Also feel free to add the point that this decision should have come before the council. As it is, your objections can be sent to Carol McCarthy in The Environment Department, Kilkenny County Council. 

Thank you for your letter of the 21st January. I urge you to revisit the allocation of the tender for the Carlow kilkenny Dog Shelter on two accounts. Firstly, it has come to my attention that it is not the Animal Care Society in Cork that you are awarding it to, even though that is who you stated in your letter. We can only fear that it is the Animal Collection Society, which deals in dead animals, that you have awarded it to. Is this so? 

I am hoping it was by mistake, as I too put in ACS to the internet and got the Animal Care Society, who have a great record of welfare and are very conscientious. On contacting them to congratulate them and share local knowledge, they categorically stated that they did not put in a tender and they would never want to be associated with the horrible practices of the collection group, using the same initials, ACS. They are very concerned by this misrepresentation. 

I have since gathered that the ACS collection group have the contract with KCC for putting down all the impounded horses in the county and are probably delighted to take on the killing of all the stray dogs too. No one, literally no one, wants this practice to continue and everyone is horrified that this might be what the council considers finding responsible management for the dog pound. 

The Healing by Franc team has another contract now in another area of management, so maybe that would allay your fears about managing a tender of this size. We will also happily address the need for enforcement of fines etc as needed. We could have filled in these details if you had met with us. I thought that might have been common practice in allocating a tender of this size. Could you let me know as soon as possible who exactly is getting the tender for the pound and if we are to be reconsidered. 

When I rang the council to speak to you this evening, the man who answered said that the tender was not decided yet, but of course I have already received my letter stating that we had been unsuccessful and that the Animal care Society were to be awarded. 

Please could we have some more transparency around this and make sure that the shelter goes to the people who will run it most appropriately with a forward looking, conscious model. 

I imagine that the collection group were happy to settle for the minimal figure available for the tender, as they will make more money on the 'carcasses', as is their practice. I would like to state here, that we would manage the shelter and dog warden services for less. We will make do and find volunteers to make it work. All the local people are keen to get involved and improve the fate of stray dogs in Kilkenny and Carlow. So do not stay with that decision on account of cost.

Accept this email as an objection received well within the 16 days, on behalf of the Healing by Franc team, all the other rescue groups, welfare-oriented local people and anyone with any compassion at all. 

Her email is carol.mccarthy@kilkennycoco.ie and we have a few days to get those objections in as the tender won't be officially awarded until the 4th February or 5th.

Thanks a lot, everyone, lets make sure the animal collection society don't get the shelter. That would be very bad news for stray dogs. 

Nestle and the end of the dairy quota in Ireland

This is a strong image isn't it! And the guy on the left is about to be further weakened by being shipped some Irish Infant Milk Formula no doubt, made by the notorious Nestle. Our short sighted government said yes to big dairy increases, despite its carcinogenic nature and despite it costing 100 gallons of water to make one gallon of milk. This little boy and many like him could really do with the water.

The vulture on the far left represents, to me, the 1st World countries and animal agriculture. Thousands of acres of rain forest and other fertile land has been ravaged to produce desperate amounts of animals and feed them up to be killed. At least in the picture, the vulture watches on. Here, people just seem to look away.

Come on guys, lets look after each other. Animals and their milk won't feed the world, they'll toxify it; with their waste via methane gas, with their eating grain and drinking water that people in 3rd world countries really need; with the clearing of land of every wildlife and tree, for grazing and GM corn and soya crops, for winter feed. Not least, the animal industry is toxifying the world with its indifference to suffering. 70,000,000 animals killed a year. The use, misuse and abuse in-between is incalculable. The word 'humanity' isn't just a term to describe a species, it includes the word 'humane'. 

All I ask is that you look at alternatives! There's vegan cheese. There's even very good vegan bacon, sausages and sliced meats. There's perfect veggie mince, that no one could tell the difference. If you're both the shopper and the chef in your house, don't tell anyone, just make the change and you'll laugh at the health improvements and better moods in the family. And where they're none the wiser, there's least resistance to change! Lets turn this energy ignorance back on itself. Make kind choices and implement them, you are saving lives: Far flung children, couped-up animals and perhaps, even, your own.

Notice NESTLE on the right…and yes they've arrived in Ireland to join in the end of the milk quota party. GMO's unlabeled, Infant formula that would kill a baby, a giant corporation that cares about nothing but the new market opening up: ASIA, Yes they don't have much dairy and as The China Study confirms, that's why they don't have cancer or heart disease either. Does Ireland really want to be the country to sell them that tragedy?