reporting cat deaths petition reaches 200000 signatures news round

<p>A loophole in the law that doesn’t comply motorists to stop if they hit a cat may not be closed. Gemma Conway’s cat Bertie went missing and hasn’t be found yet.</p> <p>When she put out messages to try and find her cat, she noticed she started receiving pictures of cats on the side of the roads that had been run over.</p> <p>Curious as to whether there was any legislation regarding collisions with cats she set looked it up. Under The Road Traffic Act 1988, motorists involved in a collision involving animals such as horses, cows, cattle, mules, sheep, pigs, goats and dogs must stop and report the incident.</p> <p>However, cats and other wild animals are excluded from this law, and therefore many collisions with cats go unreported. Rule 286 of the traffic does advise motorists to report any incident involving animals to report it to the police, however, it is not a legal requirement.</p> <p>The road traffic Act 1988 consists of 6 parts –  road safety provisions, use of vehicles and equipment, licensing of drivers of vehicles, heavy goods vehicles, driving instruction and third-party liabilities.</p> <p>All UK drivers must abide by this law. However, Gemma doesn’t want the legislation to be included in this act because of ‘cat matters’ an awareness group, says that it might restrict cats rights to roam as they do currently.</p> <p>They’ve also spoken about how the government will argue that while all the other animals listed could cause significant harm to the vehicle, a cat would not do so.</p> <p>The petition has already gathered 200,000 signatures – and if you’re interested you can sign the petition here <a href="https://www.change.org/p/change-the-law-so-cats-are-treated-the-same-as-dogs-in-road-traffic-accidents">https://www.change.org/p/change-the-law-so-cats-are-treated-the-same-as-dogs-in-road-traffic-accidents</a></p> <p> </p> <p>Concerned environmentalists across Ireland and Northern Ireland have met to discuss how best to keep the environment safe post Brexit.</p> <p>At the moment EU law has over 650 pieces of legislation that ensure that across the borders the respect of the environment is upheld.</p> <p>The group is calling for a robust law to ensure that legislation in Northern Ireland is not watered down.</p> <p>Patrick Casement, chairman of Northern Ireland Environment Link said, “Plant and animal species do not recognise the existence of a border, many of these species are currently at risk of extinction on the island of Ireland and any diluting of protection will place them in further danger.”</p> <p>For more law news and updates, visit our blog page.</p>