Christchurch City Council has gone to the dogs in the opinion of many dog owners in the city.

They’re furious after being told they must muzzle their "menacing" pets even inside their own house.

The council's sent a letter to 159 owners of dogs that have been classified as menacing.  It’s based on either their breed or their record of menacing behaviour in the past.

The letter says the animals must be muzzled at all times unless secured in a cage or vehicle.

"[That] includes on your own property and includes within the dwelling house,"

The group Christchurch Bull Breed Rescue exploded with anger on their facebook page. They said.

Up until today, I have always had great pride at how well Christchurch City Council have dealt with dog and especially BSL related issues.

Now I am just angry. Actually shaking as I type this angry.

The CCC has now decided to enforce that all menacing dogs are to be muzzled all the time unless caged. That’s in your home, while chasing the ball in the backyard, while snuggled up in bed with you. All. The. Time!

Game on CCC, animal welfare lawyers work for free. Yours will cost you a packet. We will fight this every step of the way and we have a small but very loud army behind us.

They point out  Section 5 of the welfare act. An animal must be able to display natural behaviour. Licking, cleaning, playing, eating, drinking. These are just a few “natural behaviours”.

The Council has taken legal advice but it appears that the dog owners have a point with that.  Besides animal welfare laws there’s also the concept of freedom.  How a council could think they could enforce the muzzling on private property is beyond me.

But before we start council bashing let’s look at why the council has brought the idea in.  They’re responding to an explosion of dog attacks.  Since March 2017, the council had been asked to investigate 234 complaints about dogs attacking a person, stock, poultry or domestic animals

Now the dog owners say that’s the fault of owners, not the breeds and that’s probably true.  I heard a dog control officer say the owners of dangerous dogs are 10 times worse than their animals. The dogs are feral because the owners are feral.

But I’d like to ask the owners of the dogs who are the usual suspects what you’re doing as a community to reign in the attacks.  Over 200 attacks in one city in one year is just not acceptable.  It’s a canine crime wave. It’s other people’s freedoms that are being attacked by dogs

So to the owners of menacing breeds I, say this. Just as you are responsible for the behaviour of your dogs, you’re also responsible for the irresponsible owners of your breeds.  Sort them out.

Because until you do, the rest of us who have no desire for these breeds will be forced to attack the symptom of the problem, which is the dogs, as well as the cause, which is the owners.