Travel Tips
Dover, England (AP): British customs officials didn’t just let Frodo Baggins walk right into the country — the 5-year-old black pug had to have a passport.
Frodo made history when he arrived on a ferry from France and was allowed into Britain, the first animal to come in under a new program that gives pets passports. The pilot project is aimed at replacing a 100-year-old law requiring pets to be quarantined for six months upon their arrival in Britain.
As of February 2000, dogs and cats from 22 European countries were eligible for a passport, as were guide dogs from Australia and New Zealand. If successful, the program will be extended to pets from the United States, Canada and the Caribbean in 2001, a spokesman for the agricultural ministry said.
Under the program, Frodo was allowed to board the ferry late Sunday in Calais, France, after customs officials confirmed his identity and rabies-free status. Helen de Borchgrave, his owner, carried documents including blood test results and proof that Frodo had been treated for ticks and tapeworms 48 hours before departure.
When the project is fully operational, it is expected to aid the transit of some 300,000 pets every year. Animals who fail the test will be required to go into quarantine.
Pet passports purchased in France cost $46.
(Editor’s Note: The information below was excerpted from several postings which have made the rounds on various e-mail listservs. We believe this issue is an important one to address, and so are publishing this appeal to inform all guide-dog users in the U.S. and to encourage their involvement and advocacy on this matter.)
Passports for Pets Seeks Your Involvement
To Guide Dog and Service Dog Owners, Service Dog Organizations, and Organizations and Groups Representing People with Disabilities:
I am an American service dog user (I have a Hearing Dog for the Deaf named Shona). I am one of the North American directors of a British advocacy group called “Passports For Pets” that has been lobbying to change the quarantine rules that have until recently barred all dogs and cats, including service dogs, from entering or re-entering the United Kingdom without a six-month quarantine.
At this time, if you are an American or Canadian service dog user who wishes to go to the United Kingdom, or a British service dog user who wishes to go to America or Canada and then return to the United Kingdom, you cannot do so without leaving your dog in a quarantine facility for six months. I believe that this regulation is unfair and infringes on the right of people with disabilities to travel freely and safely.
I am writing because we need your help. “Passports For Pets” has been successful in lobbying the U.K. government to allow dogs and cats into the U.K. from Europe, so we are hopeful that the British government will be willing to extend this to North America at some time in the future. However, for this to happen, the British, American, and Canadian governments need to hear from people and organizations that support this effort.
If you are a British, American or Canadian service dog user, you can help by e-mailing the Minister of Agriculture in the United Kingdom, and by e-mailing or writing your local Congresspeople or MP’s. If you are a member of, or work for, an organization that represents people with disabilities, you can also help by asking your organization to write. Some useful e-mail addresses are listed in the letter that I have included below.
While the Passports For Pets scheme is directed at all dogs and cats, i.e. pets as well as service dogs, the government needs to understand that people with disabilities and their service dogs will benefit from an extension of the “Passports” scheme to North America. Thank you so much for any support that you can offer. Please feel free to contact me if you have further questions or ideas.
Sincerely,
Megan A. Jones (e-mail: Passports4Pets@aol.com)
Passports for Pets — California Director
North American Association
International Association of Assistance Dog Partners
Appeals to Dog Users
Dear friends:
The International Association of Assistance Dog Partners (IAADP) sympathizes with the efforts of a lobbying organization, Passports for Pets USA. That organization is asking Britain to grant pets from North America the same exemption from the six-month quarantine kennel stay which Britain granted to pets from Europe last year in a pilot scheme that will end in April.
Megan, the deaf-blind woman who addressed the IAADP conference asking for letters of support for Passports for Pets USA, told me she tried living without her assistance dog. She had the opportunity to do exciting work in the deaf-blind community in Britain. However, it wasn’t long before she had to give up and return to the USA. Being forced by the quarantine rules to live without her assistance dog proved to be much too difficult.
While Britain will probably extend the “passport for pets” alternative (e.g. vaccination, microchipping, antibody titre testing) for pets in Europe indefinitely due to treaty requirements for membership in the European Economic Union, I’m pessimistic about a sudden change of heart toward dogs from North America.
There is a slight but definite increase in the risk of rabies if North American dogs are admitted, according to their scientists. That fact already has some Brits howling that it is too much of a risk.
IAADP is therefore proposing the assistance dog community adopt a “fallback position” and ask the British authorities to consider a pilot scheme for disabled people partnered with assistance dogs from North America.
This may be viewed as a politically attractive compromise by Britain. This time in their history seems to us to be our best chance at receiving a favorable concession.
I believe the mathematical projections which concern this population of dogs will reveal the increased chance of bringing rabies to the U.K. to be so small as to be statistically insignificant for this population of dogs that have passed the required antibody titre testing. That was the result when this kind of mathematical analysis was done for Hawaii in connection with the idea of admitting assistance dog teams from the USA to Hawaii.
Please join us in writing the British government and their press if you support IAADP’s position. A list of the relevant e-mail addresses will follow the IAADP letter below. (Note: we carefully say nothing negative about the Passports for Pets USA petition in our letter, and in fact ask the British government to support it, but if they decide against it, THEN as a fallback position, we ask that the Rt. Hon. Nick Brown MP propose a pilot scheme for assistance dog teams from North America.)
We suggest you identify yourself as a partner or trainer and/or by a title if applicable. You can append a copy of our letter, if you don’t want to go into detail. Personal letters giving one or more reasons why you support this change in the quarantine rules are much better, we’re told, than a form type letter, so if you can take 15 minutes to write one by e-mail, it would be much appreciated.
This is a human rights issue, not an agricultural livestock issue. I hope we can make them see that. Hoping for your support,
Joan Froling,
International Association of Assistance Dog Partners (IAADP)
The Sample Letter
Ms. Joan Froling, Chairperson
P.O. Box 1326
Sterling Hts., MI 48311, USA
Dear Rt. Hon. Nick Brown, MP:
I’d appreciate a moment of your time. I’m writing on behalf of more than a thousand disabled members in my capacity as Chairperson of the International Association of Assistance Dog Partners. Many of them live in North America. Some live in Britain. Some live in Europe or as far away as Japan. They all dream of the day when they can travel freely between countries with their assistance dogs. Until that happens, they remain shut out of employment opportunities, academic opportunities, conferences or trade shows, family gatherings and tourist travel.
This spring, your quarantine “pilot scheme” will be reviewed. It is my understanding that a decision will be made on whether or not to permit dogs from North America to travel to and from England, like the dogs from Europe have been legally permitted to do in the last year.
Instead of isolating our assistance dogs for six months in a quarantine kennel as your present policy requires, changing the rules would allow disabled people from Britain and North America to substitute the sensible, humane protocol of vaccination, microchipping, antibody titre testing and meeting all other health certificate requirements, so we could bring our highly trained canine assistants with us and continue to rely on their help during our stay.
IAADP respectfully and with tremendous hope asks for your support of this humanitarian measure as it is so crucial to our quality of life.
Perhaps it really isn’t possible to grasp how much these highly trained dogs mean to us until you lose your own sight or hearing or mobility. Taking away a service dog from someone like myself for the duration of a visit to England is no different than taking away my wheelchair, as far as the depressing and serious impact it would have on my ability to function adequately. It makes having a disability twice as isolating and difficult to cope with.
If your colleagues are not prepared to admit pet dogs from North America, as requested by the organization Passports for Pets, and other groups, would they please consider starting a pilot scheme for disabled individuals from North America who work with assistance dogs?
I believe Assistance Dogs of the U.K., Assistance Dogs International and other highly respected organizations, like the U.S. Council of Dog Guide Schools, would be willing to work together with your government if given the opportunity to ensure the success of such a program. IAADP would cooperate in every way possible.
I pray that before the end of 2001, I will be able to publicize the wonderful news that Great Britain has decided on humanitarian grounds to give assistance dog teams from North America the opportunity to visit Britain without going through a six-month quarantine kennel stay. Also that your own disabled citizens with assistance dogs will now be given the opportunity to consider jobs, academic scholarships and invitations to family gatherings in Canada or the USA, as well as in Europe, while retaining the right to bring their dogs with them without quarantine upon returning home.
I’m asking that Britain take a leadership role on this matter. If you remove this enormous barrier to disabled people having a normal life in the world community, I believe other countries will follow suit.
Thank you for considering our petition.
Most sincerely,
Joan Froling
IAADP Chairperson
Phone: (810)826-3938
Web site: http://www.iaadp.org
E-mail: iaadp@iaadp.org
Contact Information for Your Personal Letters
Send Your Letter to: c.corres@sec.maff.gov.uk. Then copy your letter, using the “CC” field in your e-mail, to: billemmott@economist.com; annabellefisher@standard.co.uk; jo.pendleharris@dailymail.co.uk; julie.daniels@thetimes.co.uk; charles.moore@telegraph.co.uk; iaadp@iaadp.org; and Passports4Pets@aol.com.