Michael Gove drops plan for complete ban on electric shock collars for pets

Michael Gove - Image credit: Press Association

Michael Gove has dropped plans for a complete ban on controversial electric shock collars for cats and dogs.

The Environment Secretary had planned to ban the devices completely, but he indicated yesterday that he would make an exception for their use with containment fences, which prevent pets from straying out of gardens and into roads.

Speaking in the Commons, Gove told MPs: "Containment fences can play a valuable role in ensuring that individual animals, dogs and cats, can roam free in the domestic environment in which they are loved and cared for."

However, he also insisted that the law would still be changed to limit the use of electric shock collars.

He said: “We want to introduce legislation to ensure that the use of shock collars as a means of restraining animals in a way that causes them pain is adequately dealt with.”

Responding to the news, Olympic gold medallist Sir Steve Redgrave – who uses an electric collar on his own Old English sheepdog – said: “I am delighted that the government is moving towards a decision not to ban containment fences.

“I agree with Michael Gove that they are a valuable way of giving pets the freedom of the nation’s gardens and I am convinced, from my own experience, that they are not in the slightest way cruel.”

Tory backbencher John Hayes – who has consistently opposed a ban – said: "The consultation process has shown how important containment fences are to the welfare of our nation’s cats and dogs.

"It has confirmed what academic evidence has shown – just how important they are in protecting pets from road traffic accidents."