Carter Chris: Dog Control Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Carter Chris: Dog Control Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:613;Page:9865] 
Hon CHRIS CARTER (Minister of Local Government) 
: 
 The previous speaker the National spokesperson Mr Ardern asked two very very good questions. He asked what the Government was doing about education about dog safety. Clearly that member has not been reading the releases from my office. If he had he would know that some months ago the Government agreed to set aside half a million dollars for a public education campaign about dog safety. That member was quite right; we could set up every law we can to try to make the community safe and to encourage the local bodies that have to enforce the law to carry out their obligations but we could never prevent especially in the home attacks by dogs. I am focusing a half-million-dollar public education programme on dog safety in schools and kindergartens in order to get that dog safety message across because it is very important. 
The previous speaker also asked what the Government was doing about making sure that the councils followed the new regulations and rules. Firstly the member should know from reading clauses 3 and 4 in Part 1 that the councils must review their dog control policies and apply strengthened criteria to places where children are more likely to gather and where attacks can happen. 
A former speaker raised the question of little Carolina Anderson the girl who was attacked in Auckland last Christmas. She was playing at a park where there was an Auckland City Council sign saying “No dogs off leashes”. That was a case where a territorial authority was not carrying out its existing legal requirements. I am not criticising the Auckland City Council; it is one of the most proactive councils but in that particular case it was not carrying out its legal requirements. What we have done is give the local authorities a strong steer to look at the issue again and they are all going to do that. They are required to give effect to their new dog control policies by making new by-laws if necessary and they have to do it quite quickly—within 60 days. 
They have until 1 September 2004 to revise their policies. I hope they do that within the spirit of the new Local Government Act which means engaging with their communities in making decisions about for example which areas will be leashed areas—where all dogs will need to be on a leash—and which areas will be for dogs to roam free. I am hoping the councils will look very carefully at the criteria that are set in the legislation; they refer to areas that the public use widely and areas where children will be found—playgrounds schoolyards and so on. Those are areas where dogs should be leashed. 
The speaker was right; we have to give a strong message to local government authorities to carry out their obligations. We have now empowered them with greater ability to do that. We have given them a strong message about the safety measures to consider in drawing up those regulations. Together with that basket of new legislation is also a package on education for people about dog safety because that is a very important part of the whole new thrust of this legislation which in the end is about keeping the community safer.