U-turn: Ministers have dropped compulsory insurance plans for dog-ownersLabour dropped its plan to make dog owners buy compulsory insurance yesterday - just a week after putting up the idea.
The lightning U-turn followed complaints from pressure groups that responsible pet owners would be made to pay for the behaviour of a minority.
The plan for compulsory third party insurance, costing owners between £80 and £100 a year, was floated by ministers in a consultation paper last week and condemned by critics as a 'dog tax'.
But yesterday, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said that compulsory insurance was 'ruled out'.
He blamed opposition politicians for misconstruing the consultation paper, saying: 'Any suggestion that we will put a tax on all dog owners is simply untrue - yet another example of desperate Tory scaremongering.'
He added: 'We don't want to penalise the vast majority of responsible dog owners because they're just as concerned as everybody else about that small minority who mistreat dogs, get them involved in dog fighting or use dogs as weapons. We've got to make sure that the public are protected and we're taking public concern seriously by asking how can we sensibly review the law that we've currently got.'
The paper last week was aimed at owners of animals kept with the intention of intimidating others, and included the suggestion of 'Dogbo' control orders for irresponsible handlers.
The Tories said yesterday that Labour had made a 'political dog's dinner' of its consultation paper. Nick Herbert, Tory environment spokesman, said: 'A dog tax on more than five million owners was proposed last week, and is now ruled out by Hilary Benn in a humiliating U-turn that just proves how tired and incompetent this government has become.'
Nick Starling, of the Association of British Insurers, said: ' Compulsory insurance is always difficult to enforce. The very people that the Government is targeting - those who mistreat their dogs or use them as weapons - are the same people who would not buy cover if it was available.'
source: dailymail
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