More greyhound stuff to talk about today. I'm continuing to inch forward with painful slowness on my research into local authority and Trunk Road Agency practice on scanning stray dogs and what they do with dead dogs found at the side of the highway. On Friday, I FINALLY got the final response in for authorities on the first question, after posing it originally on January 12th. Getting this has been like pulling teeth - I've had to repeatedly email some Councils, and in cases have had to escalate to Chief Officer level, invoke Complaints procedure, and argue with senior officers about their own information scheme - horrendous.

What has become apparent is that scanning is not universally carried out and there are some worrying gaps in practice, and more importantly information. Only two local authorities out of 22 kept accurate records on numbers of dogs scanned or wearing ID - given the forthcoming possible legislative change I find this surprising.

Results are still trickling in for the dead dog question. I have about four authorities who have yet to respond. Again though there is a complete disconnect between the departments that sort out live strays and those that shovel up dead roadkill - very few have any sort of coherence in their policy. We seem to have the bizarre situation where in some Councils, dead dogs are scanned but live ones are not, and vice versa. Also, all the Trunk Road Agencies work on behalf of WAG which is looking at compulsory chipping, and guess what? None of them scan dead dogs, even though the Highways Agency (English equivalent) has done for some time. So a case of do as I say, not as I do?

Also on the issue of campaigning, today sees the launch of a campaign to persuade WAG to adopt legislation to give greyhounds a better deal. A petition has been launched and the idea is to persuade WAG to adopt a Code of Practice for Greyhound Welfare that is legally enforceable, including things like

• Microchipping
• Vets present at races and trialling
• Better licensing of greyhound racing stadiums and breeding kennels
• Welfare sector input into licensing (a bit like prison Visitors)

I feel very torn. I loathe petitions and don't believe they are generally successful, but would like to be proved wrong on this one. Part of me is desperate for many of these measures to be implemented - if they were put in, Wales would lead the way in greyhound welfare across the UK. However, as with many things, consequences would undoubtedly be that the current situation where greyhounds are bred and raised in the Republic of Ireland then exported to the UK for racing would continue and worsen - ROI has virtually no welfare laws for greyhounds.

Also, Wales is mercifully down to only one greyhound track at the moment - near Caerphilly. I can well imagine WAG doing a Cost/Benefit Analysis and asking why legislative time should be spent on an issue which is probably going to affect only around 100 dogs, and as the recent Swansea prosecution showed, court action can currently be taken where welfare standards are poor.

Of course, one of the background issues to the Welsh situation is that DEFRA (in England) begin regulation of tracks in April of this year, which is widely expected to lead to the eventual closure of the six remaining "flapping" tracks in England, who will simply find the new regulations too expensive to implement. That's fine, and nobody will shed any tears for their closure, especially if their welfare standards are poor - BUT here's the thing. If Wales is unregulated, we could be seen as the "Wild Frontier" where racing can take place with no troublesome requirements for vets, or good animal care - we could see new tracks opening. Once that happens, it will be hellishly diffiicult to fight against them, particularly if they locate in economically troubled areas (pretty much all of Wales, then) and can recite the magical formula "Jobs and Investment". My bet is that if they turned up wanting to open a bear baiting stadium, with cock fighting on alternate Wednesdays, then as long as the signs were bilingual, and some jobs were created, WAG and local Councils would welcome them with open arms. Greyhound welfare campaigners would be seen as animal huggers trying to prevent economic activity in an area.

My other reservation is that, as already mentioned, WAG has begun work this year on a work programme which looks likely to include compulsory microchipping (at least the issue is being seriously considered). My guess is that the greyhound campaign falls awkwardly in relation to this, and the Govt can quite easily say that if microchipping is introduced for all dogs in Wales, a huge element of the traceability concerns over greyhounds will be addressed (as indeed they will ) and this will weaken the case for a separate piece of legislation for greys. Also, this year WAG has its hands full on the animal front with its hugely controversial decision to begin a badger cull in some parts of Wales. I won't get into that argument here (except to say that I think the science behind WAG's case is not convincing me, at all) but it will mean that the Govt is going to putting its small Animal Welfare section under enormous strain this year dealing with this issue - I just don't see the civil servants having spare time in their work programme for a full consultation and implementation. Finally, of course, there is the other issue of the General Election - although AM's are not being elected this year, the Westminster election will be hugely important, and the campaigning will affect the AM's in that I can't see new policies being agreed or implemented too close to a bitterly contested poll. I desperately hope this rather negative analysis is wrong, but I'm trying to make a realistic assessment of the political landscape. Watch this space as events unfold and develop. Here is the link to the BBC reporting of the greyhound story. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/8528159.stm