Page 1217 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 29 March 2017
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to better understand how many people own pets in the ACT and to better understand how we can support them to make themselves aware and to educate themselves on what it really means to own a pet.
Owning a pet comes with significant care responsibilities and making sure its behaviour is appropriate, not just in your own home but out in the community as well. There are opportunities for us through the strategy to explore better ways to do that. Certainly the instances reflected upon here today relate to what happens if and when a dog or a person is attacked by another dog. I reiterate that I am very happy—and I have indicated this to Mr Doszpot on many occasions—to agree to look at how we can further strengthen this legislation.
The really hard bit is preventing a dog that has never shown any instance of being aggressive before from attacking people or other dogs. That is the most important point—how we prevent these terrible attacks from happening. We can only do that through education and awareness and by encouraging people to really appreciate what it means to own a dog before they take that big step in purchasing what is often a really cute little puppy that can grow into a very big dog that can be difficult for people to control in public places if its behaviour has not been appropriately managed.
The motion refers to anecdotal evidence of attacks that are not reported. I encourage members who talk to members of the community—that includes me—to encourage people to report incidents. If your dog has been attacked or has attacked another dog, it is a really difficult situation to find yourself in to figure out a way of how you have that conversation on the spot at a very distressing time. We will certainly look at ways to strengthen that.
I understand the opposition will not be supporting my amendment today. For the record, I will read what my amendment says and what the opposition are going to oppose today:
That this Assembly:
(1) notes that:
(a) the number of people treated for dog attacks in EDs in the ACT last year was 155; however, it is unknown how many presentations are ACT residents.
Unlike Mr Coe, I do not find that too odd to include because I want to make clear to the community as a whole that when they go out walking they are not to be highly alarmed about any dog coming near them. There is an element of alarmism in some of Mr Doszpot’s motion.
I have acknowledged the seriousness of these issues on many occasions, but I recognise that out in the community today, we do not yet know the details of these 155 incidents that have presented to the hospital. As I indicated, some of those may be from New South Wales. In my discussions with Mr Doszpot, he sought to make clear there is a connection between presentations in EDs and the number of investigations that DAS do. He was specifically making that connection, so I want the amendment to
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