Spanish Dog Fouling Law: Are Spanish Politicians Pursuing The Wrong Agenda?



Dog fouling

Spain has some of the strictest laws regarding pets possession in Europe. One of its laws governing animal possession in Spain, for example, bans having exotic creatures as pets and requires dog, cat and ferret owners to declare their animals to the authority within three months of bringing them into the country.

Until recently, however, Spain has no law nor sanction for failure to clean up after dog fouling in public places. It was up to dog owners whether to clean up such mess. This has now changed following the introduction of the dog fouling law.

The new law states that the fine for any person failing to clean up after his or her dog fouling in a public place such as a park or kids play ground should be 1500 euros. The rationale for this legislation is to deter dog owners from leaving their dogs messing up public places such as parks. Regular visitors to parks can testify how the sight of such dog foul can be an eyesore.

However, asking dog owners who have failed to clean up after their dog foul to pay 1500 euros seems to be too high. The fine for breaking a similar law, the Dogs (Fouling of Land) Act 1996, in Britain, is just only £75.00. Does it mean that the Spanish authority intends to use the revenue from the fine to boost the economy?

Aside from the fact that the fine for dog fouling is too high, this is not the right time for Spanish politicians to preoccupy themselves with dog fouling law. Spanish law-makers need to concern themselves now with job creation plans for millions of unemployed Spanish people.

Spain currently has the highest number of unemployed youths in Western Europe. Over 50% of its youths is unemployed. These youths are at home with either their parents or other relatives. I think they need a job and would like to hear about job creation initiatives from politicians rather than dog fouling law.

After all, the increasing number of dog fouling in Spain may be attributable to the unemployment problem in the country. People in employment tend not to have enough time for dog walking. This can be supported by the fact that when the Spanish economy was good, dog fouling was not a problem.

Therefore, imposing heavy fines on dog owners who did not clean-up after their dog fouling cannot be the solution to the dog fouling problem. The solution to this problem is to fix the Spanish economy.