The Cabildo de Gran Canaria have this month gathered various bodies and security forces involved in the fight against animal abuse in the first Technical Conference on Animal Abuse.
The gathering aimed to improve the training of agents in the face of an increase in complaints about this type of criminal behaviour, derived in large part by an increase in social sensitivity over recent years, that is to say reports of animal abuse have significantly increased at least in part because citizen’s seem to care more these days and are more likely to seek intervention.
The Conference was attended by the Seprona division of the Guardia Civil, agents of the Cabildo de Gran Canaria’s Environment department and local police from the various municipalities around the island, also present were various technicians and those in charge of municipal animal welfare services. This was the first that such a gathering had been organised on the Island in such a way as to try to deal with this matter jointly.
Various experts analysed the complexity that agents face when assessing whether or not there is animal abuse in each individual case, in a way so that the authorities can more easily recognise if they are faced with facts that may indicate a crime or if it is an administrative infraction, as well as exploring what action protocols should be followed and how to focus any investigation of this matter.
Attendees worked on the topic of animal abuse from specific points of view, as each one has a different recommended course of action, such as in the case of domestic animals, of auxiliary hunting dogs or livestock production animals, such as goats, sheep or pigs, stabled in conditions that are often inadequate.
The occasion also served to provide some well-deserved recognition by the Council of Environment of the Cabildo to Germán García García, Acting Captain of the Seprona of the Civil Guard of Las Palmas, who is about to move to another post and whose collaboration and personal involvement has been fundamental over recent years to advances in the fight against abuse on Gran Canaria.
