The PAN wants the creation of a database of offenders convicted of cruelty to companion animals and announced today that it will submit “next week” a proposal to the Assembly of the Republic in this regard.
“One of the things that the PAN will want to guarantee is that (…) from a national point of view we will have a database of offenders, of people who have been convicted of the crime of cruelty to companion animals, so that from today to tomorrow they cannot operate on adoption or animal purchase platforms,” pointed, in statements to Lusa, the PAN spokesperson.
Inês Sousa Real, who confessed to being “deeply shocked” by the case of the around 300 animals rescued in Amarante on Tuesday, advanced that the PAN “will submit an initiative, to the Assembly of the Republic, to limit that someone who has been convicted of cruelty to companion animals may register an animal in their name again.”
“At this moment, there is no national database. There is, indeed, at the level of environmental crimes, publication of decisions when there is a conviction, but at the level of crimes against companion animals not only does this publicity not exist, as there is no platform or record, except the criminal record, but that is not necessarily communicated to the municipal councils, nor is it connected with the Companion Animal Information System (SIAC),” she stressed.
In other words, the PAN wants to guarantee that, from today to tomorrow, if someone who has been convicted of cruelty to companion animals tries to register an animal in their name, or even try to sell it (…), they cannot have access to any kind of license.
“We cannot watch every year the same phenomenon, that someone convicted of animal cruelty, or even someone whose animals are seized in a municipality, moves to another district or municipality to continue to accumulate and own animals in other places, far from sight, far from the populations, and perpetuate these cycles of exploitation of animals,” she stated.
Regarding the Amarante case, Inês Sousa Real praised the intervention of the Nature and Environment Protection Service (SPNA) of the GNR and of the Porto Directorate-General for Food and Veterinary (DGAV), pointing out that “they acted promptly, in a very organized way, and have been on the ground tirelessly.”
However, the PAN leader did not fail to point out that “a number so high of accumulated animals could not have gone unnoticed, which may indicate a lack of oversight.”
“One of the things that we will later try to understand is, at the municipal level, whether the municipal veterinarian actually had knowledge, whether any report was made and why there was not also a more timely intervention from the local point of view,” she said.
On Tuesday, a large operation launched in Amarante led to the identification of a woman for alleged animal abuse and the removal of more than 300 dogs, referred to associations and shelters.
