[Tonje]

Hello everyone!
To give you a little update on the Norwegian legislation - things have taken
an unexpected turn and we are a bit at loss.

The proposition for the new dog legislation caused quite an uproar as the date
for the legislation got closer. There were numerous protests, but mostly
targeted at paragraphs concerning situations where a person would be justified
in killing a dog in any manner they saw fit (apparently just about any
situation could justify dog murder - even down to little puppies if they bit
with "malicious intent" - how one should discern a "malicious" puppy from a
"normal" puppy was not discussed in the proposed law, but I digress - sorry.
However the total proposition and the development of it has been absolutely
shocking, makes one very upset). The other source for the protests was the
banning of the Am.staff and the Staffordshire Bullterrier, but the CSV was
never mentioned in the media.

The uproar finally got through to the politicians in the sense they started
talking about it to the media. Their attitude was seemingly very positive. No,
breed banning wasn't the right thing to do, and that they had understood that
you couldn't say that a breed was gentically more dangerous than a nother
breed etc. Sounded rather sensible, but then again politicians are apparently
not to be trusted. The legislation went through Tuesday - and the upshot was:
no direct banning of breeds - but - and this is one big but - the Justice
Department were given the task of banning breeds at need without having to
consult the politicians.. Wow, didn't see that one coming - SNEAKY!

In other words, the Norwegian Justice Department is free to introduce bans on
any dog breed as they see fit. This same Department developed a horrendous
proposition including the suggested banning of the CSV. Now they can do just
that without any instance having to ratify their descisions.

We are a bit at loss at what to do here. Perhaps the Justice department won't
do anything, perhaps they will. I suppose they will stay quiet at least til
over summer, as they need to let things quieten down a bit. For the time being
at least, the CSV is not banned. How long it stays that way, we don't know.

Regards Tonje