DOG OWNERS DITCHING DUTY

Councils are not doing enough to crack down on dog owners who allow their pets to foul parks and footpaths, a leading green group warns.

Yet, while prosecutions have plummeted to just two per local authority per year, complaints from the public have soared.

This is the key finding of a report published by the Keep Britain Tidy group.

It says while just 754 people had been prosecuted by respondents through the courts over the past three years - 191 last year compared with 301 in 1999-2000 - councils have received an estimated 226,000 complaints about dog fouling during that same period.

The survey, which questioned local councils in England, also found 64% of respondents had not prosecuted anyone at all last year, 57% had issued no verbal and 49% no written warnings against errant owners and 16% only ever cleaned up dog mess if someone complained about it.

While 67% had adopted a fixed penalty scheme to dish out the spot fines of £50 to those caught allowing their dogs to foul, nearly 28% of these had issued no penalties.

And while some respondents provided up to 200 dog bins in their borough, 60% placed no bins their streets and, despite the fact that fouling is found on 19% of streets in busy housing areas, 67% failed to supply them on footpaths.

Nearly all councils, 94%, do at least employ a dog warden - whose job is specifically geared towards responding to issues surrounding dogs.

Although 92% of respondents are committed to educating their residents about responsible ownership and run campaigns, 84% employ only one or two wardens and 21% of these spend no time at all on enforcement, devoting the bulk of their time to dealing with strays.

These disappointing results are given extra significance by the results of another Keep Britain Tidy study of urban parks, which found fouling at 23% of areas including close to entrances, next to busy walkways and around trees.

Not only is this unsightly, it is a health hazard since up to 16,000 people per annum get Toxocariasis, a disease contact with fouling or contaminated soil and which causes 50 cases of serious eye infection and even blindness each year

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