Ignore Valentine's Day: this is much more important

Don't forget! Put it in your diaries. Set your electronic calendars.

Chief Inspector Mark Thompson will be opening our new charity shop at 10A Market Street, Newmarket at 10 am on Monday 14th February: this coming Monday!

Please come and give us your support. The Newmarket group have worked their hearts out getting the shop ready; now they need your help to make it a success.

Extraordinary Dogs: book review

Extraordinary dogs is a collection of articles about dogs who assist human beings in an enormous variety of fields of life (and occasionally, as in the case of Scamp, who appears to recognise when nursing home residents are nearing the end of their lives; death). However it's much more than just a disjointed collection of anecdotes because each group of stories is introduced with a brief summary of the science that lies behind the dogs' abilities. It's not a book about dog training as such, but may benefit ordinary pet dogs by encouraging their owners to realise their need for mental stimulation and physical exercise. 

We tend to think that of working dogs as belonging to just a few specialised breeds, but this book shows that talent exists in breeds as unexpected as the little Chinese Crested, Yorkshire terrier and Miniature Schnauzer.

For anyone who wants to find out more, there's a useful list of organisations consulted, together with their websites, but I felt it was a bit of a pity that there were no other suggestions for further reading, or references to the science involved.

The Channel 5 series it accompanies is on now.

Interested in training as a vet?

The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons has a YouTube channel with information about veterinary careers. If you love animals and are wondering about the possibility of becoming a vet this is a useful source of reliable information.



The video series is produced in association with UK Vet Schools, including the Cambridge Veterinary School which provides clinical services to our clinic and uses it for training purposes.

Sheep rescue in Caernarfon, North Wales

RSPCA inspectors abseil down a cliff to reach a sheep trapped on a ledge.

Not suitable for anyone who doesn't like heights!

Another poor little mite

She's about three years old and was rescued by a policeman who saw her in the street being kicked in the head by her owner. Richard, our inspector, and the kennel staff, all say she's a lovely natured dog in spite of her background of abuse.

Of course, she is another Staffie.

Her owner would not cooperate by giving us any information which might help in rehoming her, not even to tell us her name.

10A Market St. starting to look good

Work in progress 

10A Market St - some work on the exterior still not quite finished

If you would like to help in the shop, or to drop off some donations, please email newmarket@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

Never blog when your temperature is more than 100 degrees

Naturally readers who can do subtraction will have noticed that 14 minus 1 = 13 not 5.

Our new shop at 10A Market Street, Newmarket is opening on Monday, 14th February, 12 days from now.

Five days to go

Only five days now until our shiny new charity shop opens at 10A Market Street, Newmarket.

Many thanks to RSPCA HQ for demonstrating their confidence in us by giving us a loan of £18,000 to fit it out.

Lorna and Val have been working hard putting up the new rails and shelving, and the gift aid tills should be delivered on Friday.

So, you've joined an RSPCA Branch Committee?

The first thing that will probably strike you is that there's a lot of paperwork and that meetings are run to a fixed agenda that may seem bureaucratic until you get used to it. Meetings start by reading through the minutes of the previous meeting and checking that everyone agrees they are an accurate record. This may appear tedious, but it's vital to have written proof of what was actually agreed if there are problems later on.

A branch committee meeting is only allowed to make decisions if there are at least 4 elected committee members present.

The next thing is that really quite frighteningly large sums of money are involved. In our case the bill for animal boarding runs at roughly £2,000 each month. The basic fee to staff our animal clinic is £2,500 and on top of that there are costs for veterinary treatment of the animals we take in and general items like rates, heating and repairs. 

As a branch, our life is a constant balancing act between not going bust altogether and constant demands to find, "just another £200" in order to save an animal's life.

The trouble is that ONE payment of £200 is not much in relation to our turnover BUT £200 repeated every day would finish us off unless we can increase our income.

Is anybody out there?

I sometimes feel that way, and evidently RSPCA HQ are the same as that's the heading of their latest volunteer survey.

If you do volunteer for the RSPCA, I urge you to complete the online form - especially if there are things you would like to see changed or have irritated, annoyed or upset you. If we don't KNOW about problems we can't fix them.

If you are a volunteer and you complete the form you'll be entered into a draw to win a day out with one of the inspectors.

In some ways the people we really need to ask are the ones who considered volunteering and either never got started or else drifted away. It came up on the i-volunteer discussion board a few days ago and, allowing for the fact that this was just one person's experience, one problem that can be fixed seems to be an explanation of why volunteers can't automatically attend and vote at branch committee meetings or vote at the branch AGM and what they need to do if they would like to get more involved in decision-making.

RSPCA branches are registered charities in their own right, governed by the RSPCA Rules for Branches, and ultimately by the Charity Commission. We can't simply re-write the rules to suit ourselves, or the result would be chaos, and because large amounts of charity funds are involved there have to be set procedures to specify who is eligible to elect the committee. Committee members are personally responsible for proper management of branch funds (and could ultimately be made to pay them back if things went really wrong). If random people could attend committee meetings and vote there would be no way to hold them to account, and it would be very awkward if it was possible to come to a meeting, push through some hugely expensive project and then leave everyone else to cope.

If you are an existing volunteer, or a new one, and are interested in taking part in decision-making at local or national level, the first thing you need to do is to join the RSPCA. (Make sure you request that your details are passed on to the local branch and that you become a branch member as well as a national one).

Three months after your application has been processed, you will be eligible to vote and stand in branch elections. You should automatically be sent details of the date of your own branch's Annual General Meeting (which is where the elections take place) and a nomination form which you can use to submit yourself as a candidate for election to the committee. You need to get supporting signatures from two other branch members (usually if you contact the existing committee they will be only too delighted to arrange this as most committees are short of members). 

For a valid election the branch AGM must be attended by at least 10 members and each committee member needs to receive at least 50% of the votes of those present in order to be elected (members can vote for as many candidates as they like, but can only place one vote per candidate).

Once you have been elected, your troubles will be only just starting...

Dog foster home needed

One of our clinic clients needs to find a temporary or permanent home for a four year old Labrador dog due to health problems (partly hers and partly the dog's).

The dog is well-behaved, friendly and placid, but has begun having occasional fits - so far only 1-2 per month, which the clinic vets have advised should be monitored, but not treated by medication at this stage. When he has a fit he loses control of his bladder and threshes about in a way which means he would be a risk to small children because of his size and strength. For the same reason he probably ought not to be left alone with other dogs. He's never shown any signs of aggression other than reflex snapping when actually having a fit.

Ideally he needs to be placed in a home where he can be restricted to areas where the seizures won't do any damage (to him or to furniture and carpets) and where he can be left to recover quietly in his own time. 

If you might be able to help, please email rehoming@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

Snap?

If you've been following the discussions about "Big Society" and the rôle of charities, you may be aware of Parliament's Public Affairs Select Committee investigation on the Funding of the Voluntary Sector. The minutes of evidence are rather long, but I was very interested by the asides about the distinction between "campaigning" and "service" charities, with some of the questioners being quite hostile to the idea that charities should try to bring about changes in the law or in the way people behave.

The Chief Executive of Marie Curie Cancer care rebutted the claim as follows:

"It seems to me that it’s a pretty fundamental principle that free organisations and free associations can campaign-that’s important. I think there needs to be a balance between campaigning and service provision, and often charities will use their experience of providing services to influence public policy. They will say, "Look, we realise that caring for people with cancer requires a different approach, and we’re going to campaign to ensure that different approach." There wouldn’t be a hospice movement if there hadn’t been both the provision of hospices by the charitable sector and also arguments on the need for more of them. It’s a combination that often takes place. Different charities will make different decisions about the balance of that. I think the best charities combine the provision of direct services and the use of knowledge to influence policy. That’s the important principle I think."   

Fired by his example, I'm cross-posting from a piece I did a few months ago on our i-volunteer page about campaigning and animal charities.

Some animal protection organisations see their primary role as the direct provision of welfare services (for example rehoming animals), while others are primarily orientated towards campaigning, or education. A few combine the two, and this may cause them some problems.

On the one hand they may be accused of diverting funds intended for animal welfare services into "political" activity (with a small p). Or, on the other, of failing to tackle basic questions of how we ought to treat non-human animals in favour of "safe" options which are acceptable to the general population.

I think this idea that providing services and campaigning are somehow natural opposites is false and actively harmful. "Speaking out for animals" may be all very well, but it isn't likely to do them very much real good unless it's backed by knowledge (which animal welfare practitioners are more likely to possess than purely theoretical campaigners). It may do them actual harm if the campaigns are based on wrong, outdated or incomplete knowledge.

On the other hand if the practitioner sees recurring problems which could be solved by education or changes in the law, it makes no sense to say, proudly: "All our money is spent on direct provision of services."

So far as I'm aware, the RSPCA is unique in providing a free service which the State would have to spend money to replace if we collapsed. The PDSA provides services which effectively top up the benefits of very poor people who depend on pets for companionship, but there would be no statutory requirement for any kind of replacement. So long as anti-cruelty laws are on the statutes there would have to be at least a minimal amount of enforcement, even if many cases would simply be disregarded as not a priority. So, in a strange, back-to-front way we're almost the ideal "Big Society" organisation, raising our own funds to provide a better service than the state would do, but at the same time saving public money by funding work the state would have to do if we weren't there. The network of RSPCA branches was doing things locally nearly a century before the Big Society Network was thought of. "Mending our communities" may be a little too ambitious, but we are providing local services for low-income families with pets. 

Charity Shop opening date February 14th

We now have a date for the opening of our new charity shop in Newmarket. 

10A Market street will open for business on Monday 14th February. This will give the volunteers a chance to practice with the new tills during the relatively quiet weekday period ready (I do hope) for a really busy Saturday.

There will be staff and volunteers in the shop working on setting up from 29th January onwards and they will be more than delighted to take in donations of items for sale. Market street itself is pedestrianised, so if you are dropping off donations by car it would be best to contact us first for directions to the access road at the back of the shops. Email newmarket@rspca-cambridge.org.uk or phone 07766 502 032 (note that the location on Google maps correctly identifies the access road, but shows the back of the wrong shop.

If you are interested in volunteering in the shop, please download and complete our shops volunteers form and bring it with you. We need to keep a record of who to contact in an emergency and whether our volunteers have any health conditions which mean we need to make adjustments to their work patterns (for example avoiding standing for long periods).

Newmarket Shop will be opening in February

The shopfitters are due to hand the refurbished shop at 10A Market Street over to us tomorrow, although there are some minor jobs still to do. We then have to put up the rails for clothes, install the new Gift Aid tills, and stock the shop.

From Wednesday onwards there will be staff and volunteers in the shop for most of the day and they will be delighted to take in donated items. Unfortunately the phoneline is not yet connected, so it's not yet possible to phone ahead. Market St is pedestrianised, but if you want to drop off donations by car there is access to the rear of the shop from the service road off the A142.


We need more volunteer, for a variety of tasks, not just staffing the till.

We need people to help with sorting and cleaning donated items (a good wash in soapy water can vastly improve the saleability of ornaments and bric-à-brac). Also, people to fill shelves, put clothes out on the  rails and help with moving larger items.

We also need people who would be willing to distribute leaflets and help with publicity to ensure that the opening is a success as first impressions are so important.

Car drivers willing to collect donations from elderly or non-driving donors would be a great help.


If you would be interested in volunteering, please email newmarket@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

Thank you to everyone who donated items to our shop yesterday

Just a quick thank you to everyone who dropped in donations to our Burleigh Street shop yesterday.

We're now opening Sundays 11 am — 4 pm, and so far it looks as though sales aren't huge, but it's a more convenient day for many people who want to donate items for sale.

Next Volunteers' meeting

Just to remind you all that our volunteers meeting is this Thursday at the Cornerhouse Pub on Newmarket Road.  They do good food, it's warm, and there will be drinks so if you have a free hour or two we would love to see as many of you there as possible.

Things will get started around 7.30pm so we look forward to seeing you there! Any questions about the venue etc. please get in touch. If you are unable to make this meeting don't worry and we hope to see you in February!

View Larger Map

View Larger Map

Update on our shops

FINALLY our new shop at 10A Market Street in Newmarket is really close to opening. The shopfitters will be starting work this Monday and should be finished by the 30th of this month. Our projected opening date is 1st February, but it's possible this may slip a little depending on how long it takes us to put all the stock out and do final tidying up.

We will be installing some of the new "gift aid" tills which will make it possible for donors to gift aid the proceeds of sale of their donated items if they are UK tax payers. The way this works is that the donor fills in a short form when they leave donations and the items are bar coded so that their sale can be tracked through the till. When a gift-aided item is sold, we send off a letter to the donor letting them know how much was raised and checking that they still want to give it to the charity. Provided they are happy for us to keep the money, they need do nothing more and we send off a monthly claim to the inland revenue who will give us an amount equal to the tax that the donor paid on an equivalent sum of their normal income. The system also helps us track our stock as it means an automatic record is kept of donations coming in and sales going out. We plan to install the new tills in both the Burleigh Street and the Market Street shops.

If you've been to 61 Burleigh Street recently you'll have noticed that our staff and volunteers worked hard over the Christmas "break" to put in a new "books and media" section in the raised area that was previously used for storage. This has approximately quadrupled the existing shelf space for books, CDs, videos and DVD's while making room in the rest of the sales area for more clothes and other items.

We've done some rationalisation of the shelves at our second hand bookshop at 188 Mill road and it is now staffed entirely by volunteers for half of the week. We would like to say a very big thank-you to the volunteers for agreeing to take on this extra level of responsibility. It is VERY much appreciated and will make it possible to continue with this shop which is much loved, but unfortunately does not have sufficient trade to cover the wages of a full-time manager and still make a profit to be used for the welfare work of the branch.

Please visit our shops to support the volunteers and make all their hard work worthwhile.

We also need donations of anything saleable. We move stock between the shops, so please feel free to take items to whichever is most convenient for you.

Branch volunteering and "Big Society"

There's lots of discussion about "Big Society" but not much light about what it may mean in practice; particularly for voluntary organisations which already exist.

Having experienced initiative after initiative over twenty-odd years on the branch committee, what  would I like to see?

• A single point for organisations to sign up as bodies who can take volunteers. One of the most frustrating things for me has been the waste of my time completing repetitive forms for each new bright idea about encouraging volunteering that emanates from Whitehall. I'd like to see a system (possibly using the existing volunteering add-on to our Charity Commission registration) that let us register as bona fide users of volunteers who are not either axe murderers or operating suicidally dangerous premises. Having done that once we wouldn't need to keep confirming that, yes, we do have a health and safety policy, Employers' Liability Insurance etc. 
• Recognition for existing volunteers if we (and they) choose. There are large numbers of people who have volunteered for years and years because they have no realistic prospect of getting paid work and they want to put something back into society. In an absolutely ideal world I think there would be an option for people like this to have an alternative type of benefits (maybe called something like volunteering tax credits) that was not a way of forcing or bribing people to "volunteer" but recognising their choice to make a contribution rather than sitting at home watching daytime TV.
• A centralised and simple way to record the amount of time volunteers have put in (maybe a website where we could submit details). Again it should be up to the volunteer and the organisation whether they want to be included.
• A single system which could be used to register any volunteer instead of the present alphabet soup of initiatives aimed at getting people into meaningful activity. Ideally this could be used to produce references and some information about what they've done to assist them in future job applications, and would be computerised rather then involving more bits of paper.
• Sort out the position of volunteers under the age of 18; most urgently those who are under 16. At the moment if a volunteer under the age of 15 wants to work in a charity shop, the shop has to apply for special permission from the local authority, and must do this for each volunteer. It would make youth volunteering much more of a practical proposition if each place where young people were to volunteer had just one set of registration requirements and only had to do one generic risk assessment of the venue's suitability for young people, rather than an individual assessment for each young person. It would also help if there was some sensible reassessment of the need for background checks of adults who will be working alongside young volunteers.

At present I strongly suspect that some young people are drawn into risky forms of activism simply because more responsible organisations dare not involve young people because of the difficulty of staying within the law.

• An educational component in all volunteering activity, to be developed by the organisation with the aim that the volunteer would learn something meaningful about the functioning, purpose etc. of that organisation, rather than simply being used as an extra pair of unskilled hands.
• A more sensible attitude to using volunteers for tasks that are sometimes done by paid staff, rather than the mantra that "job substitution" is to be avoided at all costs. Of course it would be unacceptable (and a breach of employment law) to sack paid staff and replace them with unpaid volunteers. Some roles (such as the inspectorate in our case) would be quite unsuitable for volunteers. But there is nothing magical about being paid and it is equally unacceptable to waste charity funds through a bigoted attitude that volunteers must always be subject to a paid manager and not expected to take responsibility. Voluntary organisations are not job creation schemes and, in the long run, this kind of attitude helps no-one because properly-used volunteers release funds that can be used to employ paid professionals for the tasks that genuinely can't be done by anyone else.
• A sane attitude to using volunteers to save money — of course this is a good thing (provided it can be done without detriment to services). There is nothing to be ashamed of in using volunteers to stack shelves if it means another dog or cat can have a fracture repair done by qualified veterinary staff.

(Cross-posted, with a few edits, from our i-volunteer entry).

Animal Welfare Statistics for 2010

During the whole of 2010, our clinic provided a total of 4,165 treatments, of which 2,786 were for dogs, 1,243 for cats, 87 for rabbits, and 49 for miscellaneous "small furries".

We also neutered 246 animals, chipped 248 and rehomed a total of 22 dogs, 67 cats, 11 rabbits and six miscellaneous animals.

In addition, our partner, the rabbit residence rescue rehomed a much larger number of rabbits with financial help from us for neutering and vaccinations. I don't yet have these figures, but will include them later.

Thank-you RSPCA HQ!

I've just been notified by HQ that our application for a grant to restart our emergency assistance at private vets has been approved. This means that we will be able to give at least some help to animals whose owners have not registered them at our clinic if they have an emergency which can't wait until our next ordinary clinic session.

HOWEVER:

The amount of money which will be available for each individual animal will necessarily be strictly limited; if we don't do this it will simply run out within a couple of months. Most of the time it will simply cover the vet's consultation fee, plus some initial first aid aimed at keeping the animal alive and pain-free until they can be transferred to the next available session at our clinic. 

It will not be possible to cover expensive surgery which cannot wait, such as emergency pyometria or caesarian operations, so please, please, if you have a bitch or female cat and would not be able to pay for this yourself, get her spayed unless there are medical reasons why this can't be done.

If you are on benefits (including working tax credit etc.) and know you would struggle to afford emergency treatment for your pet (or could not afford to take him/her to a vet at all), PLEASE get them registered by taking them to one of our standard sessions for a check-up or get them microchipped or vaccinated at the clinic. If they are not vaccinated and belong to a species (cat, dog, rabbit) which needs this, getting it done will protect them from several nasty diseases and will also mean that they are registered. Our veterinary service provider is only prepared to see registered animals outside normal clinic hours.

Registration only applies to an individual animal; if you have multiple animals it is essential that they all visit the clinic.