N.W.T. to look at increasing fines for negligent dog owners

Recent allegations of neglect against dog owners in the Northwest Territories have prompted the government to look at making fines tougher under existing dog legislation.

The N.W.T. does not have any territorial laws that specifically protect animals from negligence.

The only legislation that addresses the treatment of dogs is the Dog Act, which was enacted in 1988 but is rooted in legislation from the 1950s. The act currently carries a $25 fine for not feeding a dog.

"It may reflect the sense that at the time people weren't likely to neglect their dogs, because people used their dogs as working animals," said Sheila Bassi-Kellett, the N.W.T.'s assistant deputy minister of municipal and community affairs. "And if you neglected your dog, you didn't have a dog team to transport you places.

"I mean, it may have been based on something like that. But who knows? It's old legislation."

Bassi-Kellett said federal legislation that addresses animal cruelty does not help much, either.

"[Under] the Criminal Code right now, there has to be an actual intent to do harm, and so that's pretty deliberate as opposed to someone who is just negligent," she said.

"I think that there is a difference."

Neglecting dogs became an issue in Tuktoyaktuk, N.W.T., when the local dog catcher discovered three sled dogs dead and frozen to the ground in the yard of resident Randall Pokiak. Another three dogs were found to be skinny and very weak.

Tuktoyaktuk RCMP decided not to lay charges against Pokiak.

Pokiak's brother, local outfitter James Pokiak, told CBC News that he believes the dogs were sick, not neglected.

But James Pokiak said people — including some in his community — do neglect their animals, and they're the ones police and bylaw officers should be going after.

"There was some bunch of dogs tied up over at the fisheries camp by Liverpool Bay and left there to die," he said.

"Another time prior to that, a person here within the community who had a bunch of dogs … basically those dogs themselves starved, and nothing was done about that issue."

Bassi-Kellett said the government may also have to consider following the Yukon's lead and introducing its own animal protection act.