What a phoney consultation from Plymouth Council!
In 2020 our council introduced a highly contentious element to the Dog Control Act. They brought in a Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO). Almost nobody knew about this measure which banned dogs off-lead from being on sports pitches. As a result, people were fined as they unwittingly played ball with their pets in the park. £100 a fine.
The offence was not that people were not picking up poo, but they were allowing their pets to cross a white line that marks out a sports pitch. Empty pitch, nobody using it.
As I say, nobody knew about this, and so the fines started stacking up, filling council coffers. Remember, this was not because people were not picking up poo. The number of fines for that offence stayed the same as before the PSPO, very low. It was all about wardens taking photos of pets crossing white lines in our parks while they were playing off-lead.
Angry residents have been fined for doing what they have done all their lives: use the local park to walk their dog off-lead. People have been threatened by council wardens: ‘If you don’t tell us your name, your address, your date of birth, and your contact email, we will call the police. Do you understand?’ Yet the police have no interest in this matter, as the legal department in the council knows, but the intimidation has worked very well for the council. Lots of money coming in.
Entrapment is when you are caught offending where no signs are present to tell you are infringing a local order. £100 fine. This has happened time and again.
Residents have been harassed, stalked, mocked and threatened, lied to by wardens who say: ‘Just give us your details and then contest the fine’. They know full-well there is no way you can contest it.
In short, this PSPO has been in place for three years almost and has created ongoing tension between council and residents in every area where it is used, all 16 parks that have pitches.
For several months now I and several hundred others have been protesting this council’s handling of the rights of residents to walk their dogs off-lead in our parks. We are told that as majority users of our green space we must bow to the football lobby in the council who want to keep sports pitches almost exclusively for organised sport. While dogs are walked 365 days a year, football players and rugby players use the pitches for training and matches for a very limited number of hours throughout the year.
Vast numbers of people across the city have dogs. Statistics on dog ownership vary from 20% to 40% of the population of roughly 265,000 people. That means 53,000 dogs if we use 20% as a basis for ownership. In comparison, participants in organised sport must be around 1 to 2% of the population.
As part of the obligations on the council to introduce a PSPO, they must run a consultation with the public. The 2020 consultation included the question: ‘Do you think the current restriction of dogs on leads should be in place all year round on all sports facilities?’ Yes=41.7%, No= 58.3%
The council ignored this answer and introduced the PSPO anyway.
I pointed this out to the executive responsible for introducing the PSPO, and, lo and behold, that question does not appear on the current consultation. (It started July 28 and finishes August 28 this year).
The Local Government Association advises councils to have close contact with all community members who are or may be impacted by a PSPO. I know of nobody who has been consulted. Indeed, my own councillor ignored my letters of protest and when I made an official complaint about her dereliction of duty she was exonerated as she was too busy to look after ward matters and thought someone else was dealing with the issues. Really? Really?
I also made an official complaint about the chief executive of the council who, I thought, would be ultimately responsible for the behaviour of city dog wardens. No, the legal department told me it was a ‘service issue’ and he would not have known about it. Odd that, as the February 9th 2023 Plymouth Online ran a front page on my being put under duress for two hours along with another pensioner; we were stalked, threatened repeatedly with the police, taunted and eventually ended up in a doctor’s office seeking medical attention for my companion. The journalist asked Mr Bingley, the chief executive at the time, how he reacted to the incident. He said words to the effect that ‘Maybe we went a bit too far, but the policy still stands.’
This executive has offered no evidence for the need for a PSPO. We are told that people have complained about dog poo and so the council is responding. Very vague! Neither I nor any of my fellow dog owners have noticed a particular problem in any of the parks across the city. Further, when I asked the executive if the PSPO had improved the hygiene across the parks, they said it was impossible to tell. Really? So why bring in such draconian measures?
Back to the current consultation. This year there is no possibility of the council issuing damning statistics against itself, as the questions are framed in such a way that all possible answers fit neatly into their policy.
e.g. Dog controls on sports pitches
We would welcome your view on the extent of the restriction proposed for sports pitches across the city, please select one from the following options:
- Dogs should be excluded from a marked sports pitch.
- Dogs should be allowed on leads within a marked pitch.
Only the last question in the 'consultation' allows you to put forward your complaints, and that is not quantifiable, so will not prejudice their position.
I believe that there is no democracy, no transparency, no neutrality in our city council’s dealings with how our park space is used. They follow their own agenda, protect their own, and do not actually listen to public concerns. Indeed, on June 13 this year I spoke with the senior councillor on the PSPO executive, who stated categorically that the PSPO would go ahead, whatever the results of the consultation.
To me it beggars belief that one of largest cities in the UK can be run in this wild-west manner, with no accountability to anyone.
Judy Latimer
Plymstock