City council ‘seemingly disinterested’ in dog fouling issue

CORK City Council has been accused of being “seemingly disinterested” in tackling the issue of dog fouling, after it was revealed the local authority issued no fines for such offences in the first 10 months of the year.

Information obtained from the local authority shows that zero fines were issued for dog fouling offences between January and October, 2023.

The latest figures confirm that Cork City Council has issued just one fine for dog fouling in the past 22 months.

Speaking to The Echo, Labour candidate Peter Horgan said:

“The mind continues to boggle at the seemingly disinterested approach to dog fouling there is from City Hall".

“Kerry County Council conducted 173 operations this year that resulted in 12 fines - still low but an insight to some proactively at least.

“It is an issue raised on every door I knock on and will only be resolved through a change in approach by a new byelaw and proactive method of tackling the issue,” Mr Horgan added.

“We still don’t see any dog bins on the Blackrock Line or the Marina, or even on the new Tramore Valley link walk in Grange.

“It’s an area that appears forgotten.” Earlier this year, Cork City Council was accused of ‘shrugging its shoulders’ in the face of a dog fouling issue in the city, after The Echo revealed just one dog fouling fine was issued by the local authority in 2022.

In statements to this newspaper, the city council has continuously cited what it describes as barriers to issuing fines, including a lack of eye-witness and a lack of witnesses willing to go to court.

In the county however, 17 dog fouling fines were issued last year by Cork County Council.

When asked earlier this year about the difference in the number of dog fouling fines issued by Cork local authorities last year, a spokesperson for Cork City Council said:

“When comparing statistics it is important to do so in a fair and equitable manner.

“Cork County Council has five times more dog licences than Cork City Council.

“It is thus logical and proper that we would issue less fines for dog fouling".

“Given the fact that we have less that 20% of the dogs as in the county, we should therefore issue 80% less fines.

“Thus, if the county issued 17 fines then the corresponding figure for the city would be three and not 17,” they added.

Addressing the matter of actually issuing dog fouling fines, the spokesperson said:

“The difficulty in issuing fines is that the litter warden must actually witness both the dog depositing faeces, and the person in control of the dog neglecting to remove the faeces.

“The practicalities associated with this mean that it is extremely challenging and time consuming to issue fines for such offences"

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“Alternatively, a member of the public who witnesses an offence can make a complaint,” they added.

“In such cases a fine will issue if the complainant is prepared to go to court if necessary and give evidence.

“The legal requirement for the complainant to go to court in such cases is a barrier for members of the public proceeding with their complaint, as anonymity is often required by members of the public who report such instances.”