Written - The Animal Welfare (Electronic Collars) (Wales) Regulations 2010

I have today laid the Animal Welfare (Electronic Collars) (Wales) Regulations 2010 before the National Assembly for Wales. The Regulations ban the use of collars designed to administer an electric shock to dogs or cats.  This will include antibark collars, those used in remote recall systems, invisible fencing systems and electric pull leads.  Breaches of this ban could result in prosecution.

The legislation bans the use of these devices in Wales but not their sale or possession. The ban on the use of electronic training devices also covers those used in conjunction with hidden electric fences.  It does not cover those electric fences commonly used in agriculture where the shock comes from direct physical contact with the visible fence.

We have held three consultations about the use of electronic shock collars.

The first consultation covered the principle of using these devices and this was followed by two consultations on the proposed details of the legislation. I will be placing the results of the third consultation onto the Welsh Assembly Government’s website in the near future.

We have carefully considered the views expressed in the consultation exercise in the production of these Regulations. 

In addition we have notified the European Commission of our intention to make these Regulations twice under the terms of the Technical Standards Directive. 

I am now of the view that the use of electric shock collars should be banned in Wales. They are considered to conflict with positive reward based training in that the “action” of triggering an electric stimulus is not necessarily directly associated with the behaviour change sought.  Further, the science to date suggests that the use of these collars adversely affects the behaviour of animals and, in untrained hands, could cause pain or distress.

The Regulations will be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure of the National Assembly for Wales at a future date.