Rejected petition Amend the Animal Welfare Act to make fatal dog-on-dog attacks a criminal offence

Thousands of innocent dogs are attacked every year by out of control dogs, often fatally. The pain, trauma and long term mental health impact on both dog (if it survives) and the owner cannot be stressed enough. Owners of attacking dogs are rarely held to account.

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Amend the Animal Welfare Act. This amendment is the Animal Welfare (Responsibility for Dog Attacks) Bill informally known as Emilie's Law.
Under the Dangerous Dogs Act, attacks on humans, assistance dogs and guide dogs are covered but NOT pet dogs. This is a loophole which needs to be addressed. Under the law pet dogs are considered to be “chattels”. This amendment would give the police more powers to prosecute and the courts more power to impose heavier penalties.

This petition was rejected

Why was this petition rejected?

There’s already a petition about this issue. We cannot accept a new petition when we already have one about a very similar issue.

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You may wish to sign this petition which calls for a similar action:
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/637398
Make dogs attacking other pets a specific criminal offence

We only reject petitions that don’t meet the petition standards.

Date submitted 13 June 2023
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