25th of Januari 2021
The old covenants found their embedding in the draft amendment of the canine regulations, which was originally foreseen as agenda item 9 of the meeting of 28th of November 2020 but did not take place due to administrative reasons.
It is noteworthy that in this adaptation of the cynological regulations, the term ‘prohibition of breeding’ was used instead of ‘limited registration’, the term used by the FCI. With the introduction of the term ‘breeding prohibition’, the old board went one step further. Now they could integrate the ban on breeding dogs from certain breeds into the cynological regulations. What the Dutch Kennel Club actually intended was to impose a ‘Limited Registration’ on certain breeds, which could be deviated from if the dog proved to meet the criteria mentioned in the covenant.
A second important addition (draft article III section 28/article III section 21 point i) was that a breeding prohibition could be imposed by the Board of the Kennel Club at its own discretion. This independent from the Breed Associations and/or its members.
Subsequently, draft article VIII 10 KR stated that owners of dogs should follow the national legislation on this matter. Normally, this article would be totally redundant, after all, every Dutch person has to obey the law. However, in this case it is necessary to amend this cynological regulations because the issuing of pedigrees is not against the law in itself. By including this in the cynological regulations, the refusal of pedigrees is legitimised towards the breeders and above all towards the FCI.
The inclusion of this article in the cynological regulations, by the way, had directly added the CFR’s covenants as a criterion, even though no CFR is mentioned in the covenants.
Considering the fact that all these changes in the cynological regulations were necessary to be able to refuse pedigrees without the approval of the general meeting of members, one can conclude that the pedigrees now are actually illegally not issued anymore.
If I am wrong, I would like to see responses with KR article numbers on the basis of which it was legitimised.
This fact alone gives the new board reason enough to issue the pedigrees again because in our opinion they have been withheld unlawfully.
However, we all agree that something has to be done, starting of course with the brachy breeds. A broad-based committee could develop a master plan for this in the short term, based on proactivity rather than reactivity. But constructive and not repressive. After all, we are slowly beginning to experience first-hand what a repressive attitude can lead to in this country.
Edwin Meyer Viol
Foundation Justice for Pedigreedogs