Epsilon Archive for Student Projects

Abstract

Immediately taking charge of animals is one legal measure of animal protection that is regulated in the Swedish animal welfare act (2018:1192), from hereon called the AW act. The same legal measure, which regards dogs only, is regulated in the law of supervision of dogs and cats (2007:1150), from hereon called the law of supervision, to protect society from harm or considerable inconvenience. Within regular office hours, it’s the Swedish County Administration Board (CAB) that’s in charge of ensuring that the animal welfare legislation is complied with. Both the CAB and the Swedish police can immediately take charge of animals for animal protection purposes. However, only the Swedish police can immediately take charge of dogs for other reasons than animal welfare, such as protection of citizens or property. Outside of the CABs’ office hours, the Swedish police have legal authority to immediately take charge of animals they encounter during police work.
The aim of this study was to examine the occurrence of authority decisions being made of immediately taking charge of animals outside office hours and to map out where in Sweden this happens. The aim was also to investigate what challenges the CABs and the Swedish police experience with immediately taking charge of animals outside of office hours and how they perceive its effect on the animals. Both the AW act and the law of supervision were considered.
This study was done in two parts. The first consisted of gathering statistics from the Swedish police where the data was related to cases where animals have been immediately taken charged of between the years 2020 and 2023. The second part involved semi-structured interviews with a total of eight respondents from selected CABs, police regions and the Swedish police’s national animal protection group. All interviews were performed digitally except one that took place over the telephone.
The results showed that the Swedish police made decisions on taking charge of animals most often in Stockholm with 25,8%, Skåne with 14,7% and Västra Götaland with 13,2%. Most of the decisions were based on the AW act with 82,6%, while only 3,3% were based on the law of supervision, while the remaining 14,1% were never subordinated to the CABs. The majority of animals which were included in these decisions were in the counties Skåne with 27,7%, Stockholm with 21,1% and Västra Götaland with 11,8%. Of the decisions, 41,0% were made within office hours, while remaining 59,0% were made outside of office hours.
The interviews revealed that the police and CABs shared both common and diverse experiences of the challenges and what impact taking charge has on animals. The important, common ground they share were the application of legislation, deficiencies in case management and communication, and practical challenges. The respondents perceived that the animals being immediately taken charged of are affected to a certain degree, but there’s need of further study to what extent and how.