Alison Standbridge is a leading voice for animal welfare in Romania, and she focuses on the issues the dog rescue movement sometimes seems to neglect. Her charity, Paws2Rescue, recently ran the first stage of a nationwide brucellosis research project, testing 100 dogs for this zoonotic disease, and will be running the second stage later in the year. As brucellosis cases have been rising in the UK too, we must know where the disease is and whether there are local hotspots both in the UK and in Romania, where tens of thousands of our rescue dogs come from every year. Listen to find out about health screening in general and what Alison has learnt about testing quality.

Paw2Rescue also runs a vet scholarship programme, and the charity runs spay-and-neuter campaigns throughout the year. And to ensure the local community is not ignored, Paws2Rescue volunteers run their 'shoebox campaign' every Christmas, donating presents to low-income families throughout Romania.

Alison is outspoken about the work of other organisations and critical of what she calls pop-up adoption charities that seem to be hardly more than a money-making scheme. Adoption, she makes clear, isn't solving the problem of Romanian street dogs. "But trying to make [adoption] their solution is like using a teaspoon to empty the ocean. These pop-up people always say 'we [charities] need to educate'. Show me, because they might do one year to campaign a year and shout really loudly about it. They'll do the one-off token one just to tick the box, but they're not focusing on helping the stray dog population in the country of source."

I know you will enjoy this episode with Alison, which also touches on the Kept Animals Bill and Alison's work with Defra.

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This episode of The Dog Manifesto comes to you from the RSPCA headquarters in Horsham, with guest RSPCA Director of Policy, Prevention and Campaigning Emma Slawinski.

A lifelong animal lover who has dedicated her career to charitable causes for humans and animals, we talk about the RSPCA's 200th anniversary and the state of animal welfare, before getting into The Dog Manifesto.

Emma explains what the generic term 'lobbying government' really involves, and she also expands on why tougher regulation is needed to curb inbreeding of dogs, while dismantling breed-specific regulation.

As a strong supporter of The Dog Manifesto, Emma has encouraging advice for those planning to campaign for animal rights. She also came up with a great alternative slogan for The Dog Manifesto: "It's about the dog.

dogmanifesto.org #VOTEDOG

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This is part two about the leading animal welfare programme Calgary Model. Ryan Pleckaitis is the chief bylaw officer at the City of Calgary, and he oversaw the Responsible Pet Ownership bylaw being comprehensively updated.

We talk about being proactive with education and public awareness campaigns to prevent incidents. Regarding the education-based dog licence outlined in the Dog Manifesto, Ryan suggests starting small. In terms of breed-specific legislation, Ryan says the citizens of Calgary have not wavered and are committed to their breed-neutral approach. Last but not least, Ryan explains new initiatives, including a ‘dog bite detective’ and an AI-assisted push notification system to find lost dogs.

dogmanifesto.org #VOTEDOG

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