Chf Insp Emma Cheney of South Yorkshire Police says record dog injuries are a 'social catastrophe'

Transcript

00:00I'm Chief Inspector Emma Cheney from South Yorkshire Police. In South Yorkshire

00:05we've seen a record number of incidents and actually injuries caused to members

00:09of public as a result of dangerous dogs over the last few years, since lockdown

00:14really, since 2020 to 2021. Since the XL bully ban last year we've naturally seen

00:19a decrease in the number of XL bullies, they've lost their value in terms of

00:23market value. We'll start to see an increase in the popularity of other

00:27breeds, such as the Cane Corso. But what we need to be really clear about is that

00:31these dogs can weigh nine, ten stone, so you just imagine the power and the

00:35ability that that dog's got. Can you cope with a dog that weighs nine or ten stone

00:39in your house? In South Yorkshire we see on average five incidents a day across the

00:46organisation related to dangerous dogs. In 2024 we had 1700 investigations related to

00:53dangerous dogs and it's fair to say that we've had no additional resources in

00:57terms of finances or extra police officers to manage this demand. My message

01:02and my plea to dog owners is please really, really think twice before you

01:06obtain a dog. Think really carefully about what kind of dog you are going to get,

01:11whether you're able to train it, discipline it, to look after that dog

01:14appropriately. And then to existing dog owners, again my plea is just to make sure

01:19that you keep your dog under really safe control. And my main concern is around

01:23children and safeguarding. If you've got a potentially dangerous dog and you've got

01:28a child in your household, you need to think really, really carefully about how

01:31safe your child is with that dog.