“
It's inconceivable that we will stop collecting animals,
” laments Sara.
The 23-year-old young woman has been managing the Ani'Meaux association since 2018, which annually collects nearly 200 abandoned cats and dogs or victims of mistreatment in Meaux (Seine-et-Marne) and in the surrounding municipalities.
For lack of space and money to create a refuge, this secretary works with about fifteen foster families who house the animals in their homes while waiting to be able to have them adopted.
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But recently, the fate of the association has been suspended. In question, the bill against animal abuse, adopted at first reading by the National Assembly on January 29. Article 3 bis, which provides for
"giving a legal definition of the host family which must be attached to a refuge"
is at the heart of the concerns. If the text is adopted as is, Sara, who does not have a physical structure at home, will have to cease all collaboration with her host families, putting an end to her mission against abandonment. More than 3000 animal protection associations without a structure like his are thus concerned.
“It's inconceivable,
” she repeats angrily
.Especially when we see that
all the shelters are saturated
".
The latter were also seized with a wind of panic upon reading the article.
"
If the text were adopted in the state, it would be a disaster
", indignant Jeff Legueulle, general delegate of the Foundation 30 millions of friends which supports more than 200 refuges partners in France.
“
The shelters are already overcrowded and will not be able to absorb the flow of animals that these associations take care of.
This will result in more euthanasia,
”he predicts.
Saturated shelters
France has only 770 shelters. An insufficient number to accommodate the 100,000 animals abandoned each year, recognizes the deputy, Loïc Dombreval, deputy La République en Marche and co-author of the bill against animal abuse. Especially since these structures are distributed unevenly over the territory, some departments being better provided than others. This situation can be explained in part by the technical constraints imposed on the creation of a refuge. It is indeed impossible to settle too close to houses because of the noise of the animals. It is also necessary to have a sufficiently large surface to accommodate them in good conditions, which hinders their establishment in cities.
To support this sector, the government has put in place since January as part of the recovery plan an
"aid to finance works or equipment for shelters for pets"
in the amount of 20 million euros
.
An
“unprecedented effort”
underlines Loïc Dombreval, but insufficient for 30 Million Friends. In an attempt to maintain the number of shelters in France, the foundation regularly puts its hand in the wallet in order to save the structures it supports.
"We pay them 3 million euros every year in two installments: in summer when we see an increase in dropouts, and in winter when shelters have more costs, especially in heating," he
explains.
"It also happens that we occasionally help sites that are threatened with closure because they do not have enough resources to meet standards," he
adds.
Illegal shelters and pounds
This critical situation pushes some shelters to welcome more and more animals even if it means exceeding their capacities and putting themselves in illegality, deplores Jean-François Legueulle. The pounds are also sometimes forced to circumvent the law. The rural code provides that after eight days, if the animal has not been claimed by its owner, it may be entrusted by the pound
"to foundations or animal protection associations with a refuge which , only, are authorized to offer the animals for adoption to a new owner ”
, excluding in fact associations without structure. However, "
there are cases where it suits us to be able to confide in them
», Admits Jean-François Fonteneau, president of the SACPA group which manages a network of impoundments. Because if no place in a refuge is found, the animal can be euthanized, specifies the rural code.
Good in bad year, associations, shelters, pounds were therefore organized away from the eyes of the State. And although welcomed by the entire sector, the law against animal abuse and its article 3 bis come to seize the cogs of a mechanism already at the end of its rope. "
We may explain the situation to the ministry and to the deputies, they persist without suspecting that this will cause damage and especially more wild abandonment and animal abuse
"
,
insists Nicolas Biscay, head of the Espoar collective who has been campaigning for several months for the withdrawal of the article. According to him, "
there is a deep ignorance of the subject
". Jean-François Legueulle agrees with this: “
the text was written by legal theorists who do not have a practical vision and who did not realize the responsibility they were going to place on shelters and the harm they will do to animal protection
".
The general delegate of the 30 Million Amis Foundation, however, puts forward an explanation for this much-maligned article.
“There was a legal vacuum concerning host families and they started from the principle that as shelters are subject to regulations and controls unlike other associations, it is necessary to hang up host families at these shelters. so that they are framed, ”he
summarizes.
Backpedaling
Contacted by
Le Figaro
, Loïc Dombreval recognizes indeed
“that it is probably necessary to work on evolutions”
of the text.
"It is obvious that the shelters were afraid of having to recover a certain number of animals present in the foster families when they face a saturation,"
he admits. He assures us:
“We may not have been specific enough. We will be even more so and reassure them ”.
A half-word mea culpa with conditions attached. Indeed, if the deputy recognizes the need to maintain the link between associations without structure and host families, the latter two will have to meet requirements similar to those imposed on shelters and thus be able to be controlled.
“The problem is that currently, we do not know very precisely who these foster families are or how they welcome the animals because there is no entry / exit register, no guarantee on their training and their capacity. to keep animals properly.
There is therefore an imbalance because these strong constraints nevertheless weigh on the shelters ”
, underlines Loïc Dombreval.
Read also France, a poor European student of animal abandonment
These rules are, according to the deputy, the starting point of any evolution of the text. Yet they are nothing new. Aware of the discrepancies or even abuses of certain associations, the Espoar collective asks for their
"professionalization" in
order
"to increase their skills"
and obtain
"recognition of their activity which will allow them to officially remove the animals from the pounds"
.
"We are open to any proposal for a solution and to better supervision,"
also assures Sara, who already has several training courses to her credit and says she is open to taking new ones.
"The vast majority of associations are in favor of more regulation"
, confirms Nicolas Biscaye, who hopes to convince Loïc Dombreval on Monday. The deputy invited associations without and with refuge to discuss the possible evolutions of the criticized article before the text passes before the Senate on September 30 and October 1.