The Ministry for Animal Rights recently unveiled its three-year plan for animal welfare reforms, which has brought the issue back into the public eye and revived discussions on related matters.

In an interview with The Malta Independent on Sunday, Commissioner for Animal Welfare, Alisson Bezzina, reflected that she is extremely happy that the ministry has taken on her recommendations for legislative changes that would benefit animals, saying that a lot of the suggestions that she made over the years have been included as part of the planned reforms.

She added that she is still sceptical about the timely and effective implementation of these reforms due to historical precedence, but she is hopeful now given that it’s in writing and public. Bezzina has said that if these reforms are effectively and efficiently implemented, they could result in a rejuvenation of the Animal Welfare directorate. 

She said that there is a noticeable improvement with regards to suggestions done by herself and other animal activists being noticed by the Ministry and appreciates that things seem to be getting done faster and more efficiently. She added that there is still room for improvement when going ahead with changes and that time wasted means that more live animals are suffering. She added that more direct and active involvement from the government is always welcomed. She went on to say that these changes have been requested for a long time by previous commissioners as well as other activists, volunteers and NGOs that have been tirelessly pushing for action. 

The government in 2020 proposed a legislation to regulate zoos and during the past three years no information, regarding the actual status of these laws, has emerged. Bezzina said that she has not heard of any updates either. Keeping that in mind, the commissioner was asked for her views about a law which was recently passed allowing dangerous animals to be used in the film industry, also acknowledging that this law allows for lethal weapons to be present during filming in case the animals get aggressive. 

Why would a law like this be passed so quickly when animal welfare legislation such as those of the zoos have taken so long? Bezzina replied that in her attempt to be as understanding as possible, she understands that politicians need to weigh the consequences with regards to other areas, as opposed to her position as commissioner where she only has one ultimate goal in mind, that of the welfare of animals.

“Politicians do not have only one aim, they are being pulled from different sides and need to see and balance different needs so in this case they also have to weigh the value of the film industry and how passing this law attracts more films to Malta. I would imagine that they would have assumed that if they did not pass this law we would have a problem attracting the level of film money that we would want to attract. It’s a pity that financial gain is being given priority over animal rights and welfare.”

The Malta Independent on Sunday last week conducted an interview with Rosalind Agius from the Association for Abandoned Animals. The salient point from that interview seemed to be that Agius, as well as other animal activists, are concerned with how lax enforcement on animal cruelty laws seems to be. Agius said that she is always in favour of reforms and laws that will help animals, but wants them to actually be enforced for some tangible progress. 

Asked for her thoughts on these concerns, Bezzina said: “The first step is to convince politicians that you actually need a particular law. The second step is to establish the law the way it should be. The third step is for the public to be made aware of that law through an education campaign and then it starts being enforced. Unfortunately, it's not just with animal welfare cases, enforcement is very weak in Malta for most things, and this is one of them because it is difficult to enforce it if it is not easily visible.”

She said that the process of checking if a dog is microchipped is not always straightforward and that sometimes the details on a dog’s microchip may be outdated or inaccurate. “So it is a bit of a complicated law to enforce; but I keep pushing that we need to find ways to enforce it with random checks, awareness campaigns and vets advertising that dogs and cats should be chipped with accurate information. But yes, at the moment enforcement is very weak on all animal welfare legislation.”

The Animal Welfare commissioner said that it is important for dogs to be microchipped because it is an indisputable identifier of who they belong to. Tags or collars can be lost or removed, but a chip cannot. If you lose your pet and it’s been chipped, there is a much higher chance that you will be reunited. 

With that in mind, Bezzina was asked why in Malta it has not been required for cats to be chipped the same way as dogs. She replied that there were several objections raised throughout the years in this regard, largely due to the fact that it is not uncommon for cat owners to allow their cats to freely roam outside which makes it difficult to determine whether a cat is a stray or not, meaning that you would not call animal welfare to check up on every wandering cat.

“At first there was a bit of resistance as to why we need to impose this on cat owners, but now we're at that first stage I mentioned before. Politicians have been convinced that it needs to be done and we are at the education stage of informing the public before it is put into law; it is in the pipeline.”

The lack of resources faced by the Animal Welfare Directorate has been well documented. Asked for her thoughts on the situation, she said: “The resources might have improved a little bit, but they are not anywhere close to matching the demand; it is still very lacking. So this is why we are hoping that if everything within the reforms document is implemented, they should have the resources to actually finally match the demand. Up until now we still lack the resources needed.”

Following this train of thought, Bezzina was asked about the dog breeding situation in Malta and why it has a negative connotation as well as what could be done to improve the situation. She explained that sanctuaries and animal welfare are completely full and cannot take in more dogs unless they are injured, so a lot of animal activists, who care for all dogs, make the point that dog breeding is irresponsible as we are bringing more dogs when there are already so many abandoned on the street.

“The improvements that can be made with the breeding legislation as it is are huge because the legislation at the moment is almost non-existent. It's very vague. That's why we have so many backyard breeders, and breeders who don't know what they're doing.” She said that at the moment you are legally allowed to breed up to four litters a year without being licensed, meaning that anyone can start breeding and selling up to 40 dogs in a year and have no legal obligation to register themselves or tell the authorities. “If you're not a breeder with 40 puppies a year, I don't know what makes you one?”