My best ever job (an essay on the joys of mistreating animals)

Let me tell you about the job I enjoyed most. I worked at garden centre in Finchley (long gone and replaced by a housing development) for a couple of months in the early 1980's. During the "growing season" they would employ a few extra hands to help with loadings and deliveries. There were many reasons I loved the job. I was out all day in the open air. It was strenuous physical work which I enjoyed (loadiing and unloading bags of peat, compost etc). Dealing with the customers was fun (most gardeners are lovely people). There was also a rather attractive blond called Susan who worked there who I was rather keen on. Whilst that was clearly the best part of the job, a close second was the guard dog. When I turned up, there was a compound at the end of the yard, almost hidden from customers, with a large German Sheppard dog called Winston. If anyone approached the dog, he'd go completely bonkers. One of the owners used to exercise him on a daily basis and this process started with the owner tooling up. This involved putting on protective clothing and carrying a large stick. The last job of the day was to let Winston out so he could roam the place and eat any intruders. The first job of the day was to get him back in his pen. Being a dog lover, I was rather upset when I approached this huge dog and he went bonkers. He clearly wasn't pleased to see me. A quick enquiry of the owners told me "He's psychotic, he's not a normal dog, but he's a great guard dog, stay well away".

Well, I've never been one for doing what I was told. Every day I'd bring a selection of tasty treats in for Winston and at various times nip along to his pen and give him something. After a couple of days, he'd see me and bark in a friendly manner, wagging his tail. The owner, who had been bitten several times by Winston, noticed and said "You can take him for his walk if you like". As this meant an hour of doing nothing except walking a dog, chatting to other dog walkers in the park and having a crafty smoke on the job, it seemed like a great idea. I'd always have a pocket full of bits of bacon rind, old sausages, etc which ensured total obedience. After a couple of weeks, I decided to see if Winston could be trained. It turned out that this psychotic monster was highly intelligent. Not only could he sit, I trained him to jump over benches, retrieve things I'd hidden and all sort of other things.

One of the worst problems I had with him was that as soon as he saw another dog, he went bonkers. As he was probably the largest German Sheppard I've ever seen, this presented a problem. The owner who walked him dealt with him by clubbing him with a stick (and then Winston would bite him, if he could). As I thought about this, I realised that every time he saw another dog, he realised the owner was anxious. As a result, he got anxious and went bonkers.He then got clobbered so he got angry. How do you fix this problem. You take the stress out of the situation for the dog. It took a week, but he got the idea. As his social problems diminished, I started to get to know some of the other dog owners (mostly attractive young mums). They told me how they would not buy from the nursery as the owner was so mean to the dog.

After I'd been working there for about three months, something happened. By this time, I'd let Winston off the lead and throw sticks for him. He was the perfect dog. One of the other dog walkers was an extremely attractive young woman, who asked me if I fancied a coffee. It seemed like too good an opportunity to pass up. The two dogs were happy playing. Anyway, rather than the usual hours walk, I ended up being gone for two hours. As I returned, the management team were looking highly anxious. Where had I gone? What had the dog done? I'd already prepared my cover story.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Winston slipped his lead and it took me an hour to get him back". The owner started screaming at me that I was an idiot and that he had to be controlled at all times. He then said "I hope you gave him a good hiding when you caught him". As he said this, he waved the stick at me. Winston was none too impressed and bit him. I immediately pulled Winston off and made him sit. The owner then started hitting him with the stick (even though he was now passive). I screamed "Leave the dog alone". At which he sacked me on the spot (Just for the avoidance of doubt, the owner wasn't Brian, who was the manager and later bought the business and is a lovely bloke).

I felt terrible. I toyed with the idea of stealing the dog but I had nowhere to keep him. I felt like I'd betrayed him. A couple of years later I was talking to someone in a pub about guard dogs. They told me that the best way to train a guard dog is to get someone they don't know to creep up on them when they are asleep and beat them with bamboo sticks. Apparently this makes them aggressive towards anyone who creeps around who they don't know.

At the time I was a teenager. I went home and told my folks I'd been sacked. My Dad asked "what for". I told him that I'd told the owner to stop beating the dog. The old man asked why he was beating the dog and I said "Because the dog bit him". The old man asked why the dog bit him and I explained what happened. The old man thought it was hilarious. He said "He must have been chuffed, he's been paying you to look after his dog and you trained it to bite him". It confirmed my Dads opinion that I was a complete idiot. As I got older I've realised that many of my dad's judgements about me at the time were spot on. I must say that this was one judgement one which I think I'll always disagree.

I don't think it's ever right to beat dogs and I think that if you do you deserve to get bitten.

Barnet Council and the dog poo revolution

As some of you who read the blog will know, I'm standing for Barnet Council in the May 6th elections. I'm standing for the Lib Dems in Mill Hill ward and we've been doing our best to find out what really upsets our friends and neighbours, so we can do something about it if we win. It will come as no surprise to anyone that what bugs our friends and neighbours is what bugs us. Take for example all of the potholes currently wreaking havoc with all our cars. Do you know anyone who likes Potholes? Well I do, my brother is a welder and he's making a fortune mending broken alloy wheels. Apart from him though, we are all fed up with them. Of course the Council aren't quite so bothered because they aren't the ones paying for the broken wheels and damaged suspensions.

One thing which comes up time and time again is dog poo. Specifically dog poo in parks and council run open spaces where children play. Talking to people, a major worry is the way professional dog walking services are taking huge numbers of dogs, 10-15 at a time for walks on public land. They are using council ameneties to run their businesses. They are not cleaning up after their dogs and often don't have the packs of dogs under control. I really worry that there is going to be a really awful incident in our open spaces. I have discussed this time and again with local Conservative Councillors and get the same answer "It's not the Councils job to regulate private individuals and companies". Well I think that in this case it should be. That is why I'm going to be calling for Barnet Council to do the following in relation to professional dog walking services.I am in the process of drawing up the details of a "professional dog walker licensing proposal". This will regulate the walking of more than 3 dogs on public land. The key points I've identified :-

* Professional dog walkers should wear an identifiable jacket with a registration number on
* All dogs walked by professional dog walkers should wear an identification tab on their collar
* Professional dog walkers must keep all dogs under control at all times
* The council should have a helpline or email address to report breaches. Services which are regularly reported should lose their license to operate
* All dog walkers should face fines for not cleaning up dogmess
* All professional dog walkers should attend a training course and be certified as a "competent operator

Oh and in case you are wondering, I've got a lovely boxer dog called Tilly (see piccy taken in snow at Arrandene) and I always carry a poo bag when I take her out for walkies. She has a certificate tto say she's passed obedience classes (although anyone who knows the breed will wonder how she managed this).

 At the moment these are draft proposals. I'm really keen to hear from residents, so that we can stand on platform of removing dog poo from our green spaces, rather than be standing in dogpoo in our green spaces. CLICK HERE to email any comments to me you may have on these proposals

Kit Malthouse needs to get himself a Willy !!!!!!

Margaret Thatcher once said that "everyone should have a Willy" You may think that this is a rather curious remark for the first female Prime Minister to make, but she was referring to her right hand man - William Whitelaw.What Lady Thatcher was actually saying was that Whitelaw was a steady hand, a voice of experience and reason. A man who's judgement could be trusted. Whenever she was tempted to act rashly, lash out in a knee jerk reaction, she would discuss it with Whitlelaw and he'd persuade her to temper her reaction.

So why do I think that Boris Johnson's Deputy Mayor, Kit Malthouse could do with a Willy? Well today there are not one, but two blogs on the Tory Troll blog, which suggest to me that a bit of calm, sensible advice over a nice cup of tea may be of use to Mr Malthouse.

First he is proposing that "all breeds of bull terriers" are summarily ceased in the United Kingdom. he want's to follow the draconian legislation enacted in Ontario, where all of these dogs are forced by law to be castrated. Any non compliance and the poor little doggies are taken of and put down. As the owner of a dog for many years, I know and any sensible dog owner will know that it isn't the dogs, it's the owners which make them aggressive. Sensible owners will generally neuter overly aggressive dogs. I'm all for a law which bans people from keeping dogs who are unfit owners, but to commit ethnic cleansing on the doggy population of London is a horrible concept. Mr Malthouse hasn't twigged that many Tory voters like dogs and this would be a massive vote loser at the election.

Just to make matters worse it seems that someone, shall we say, very, or even extremely close to Mr Malthouse has been leaving messages on the Tory Troll website.These "anonymous" messages are always rather supportive of Mr Malthouse. It's well worth clicking on the link to read the full story.

Now I wonder. If Mr Malthouse actually did have a Willy, what would his Willy say to him about these. I suspect Kit's Willy may have this message about his genocide for Dogs idea

"Kit, this is your Willy talking. Have a nice cup of tea. Sit down, relax, think it through. Many old dears who like the Tory party, like doggies even more. If you bring in your "gas chambres for doggies" idea, we'll loose thousands of ardent supporters, just when we need them most. If you want to deal with dangerous dogs, target the problem - bad owners - who no one will vote Labour to save".

And what would Kit's Willy advise him to do about his "rather close associates" leaving messages on nasty bloggers sites, using anonymous ID's?

"Kit, this is your Willy talking, have a nice digestive biscuit with that cup of tea. These Leftie bloggers are nasty people. They know all the nasty tricks of the internet and they love trying to catch honest, decent, upright people such as your good self out. If you see something you don't like, ignore it. Getting your "friends and very close associates" to post messages will only make you look rather silly."

Now as ever, being a dyslexic, I ran this by my good Lady to tell me if I'd made any terrible typo's. She tells me that Willy Whitelaw is actually a Willie !!!!!! She informs me that a Willy is a part of your anatomy !!!!! Even so, if I was Kit, I'd start listening to my Willy as I suggested, rather than talking through that other rather naughty bit of his anatomy, as he seems to be doing in his "gas the doggies" scheme. We wouldn't want him to end up looking like that even ruder bit of anatomy which Lady Thatcher had and Willie Whitelaw didn't, would we?