BBC Yorkshire story - tethered horses

Nancykitt

Nancykitt

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I saw this piece as I was scrolling through Facebook. It's one of those where I feel there's gaps in the story.
I can't work out if the owner was served notice or if they just turned up and took the horses away.
I also don't know how long they were there...
And then there's the stuff about the £12k fine (which does seem huge) - but one of the horses has been reunited with the owner?
There are hundreds of comments on the Facebook page with a pretty binary response; lots of people saying that tethering three horses on a small patch of ground was utterly crazy, others very much in support of the owner (who has herself commented on the FB piece.)



www.bbc.co.uk

Keighley mum's heartbreak at £12,000 fine over seized horses

Jade Holdsworth, from Keighley, says her horses were only temporarily tethered on council land.
www.bbc.co.uk www.bbc.co.uk
 
I think there’s a lot of journalistic licence going on here. It seems the horses were on loan and ‘therapy support?’ Whoever was in charge of the support should surely have been keeping an eye on what was going on. Three horses outside your back door take a lot of looking after, maybe one or two ‘parked up’ for an hour of two whilst the kids have a nice time grooming them but threes a lot and how did they get there given they were then removed by someone employed by the council who left a note? Sounds like a good plan for a fairytale book.
 
Nancykitt said:
I saw this piece as I was scrolling through Facebook. It's one of those where I feel there's gaps in the story.
I can't work out if the owner was served notice or if they just turned up and took the horses away.
I also don't know how long they were there...
And then there's the stuff about the £12k fine (which does seem huge) - but one of the horses has been reunited with the owner?
There are hundreds of comments on the Facebook page with a pretty binary response; lots of people saying that tethering three horses on a small patch of ground was utterly crazy, others very much in support of the owner (who has herself commented on the FB piece.)



www.bbc.co.uk

Keighley mum's heartbreak at £12,000 fine over seized horses

Jade Holdsworth, from Keighley, says her horses were only temporarily tethered on council land.
www.bbc.co.uk www.bbc.co.uk
Click to expand...
It used to be common to see tethered animals periodically grazing verges, probably not in built up areas, which this seems to be.
Typically they kept getting moved along for fresh grass, so build up of droppings and churned verges wasn’t really an issue, sometimes concerns their water was tipped over, but seemed to work reasonably well and be tolerated for short periods. Plus, verges were left short and usable once they’d gone!
The law in relation to travellers altered early 1990s, and ‘fly grazing’ has been contentious - for some very good reasons.
Horses that work a tether usually tie up and lead politely, and tend to become adroit at managing the line. They need to be well away from other tether lines, and definitely no foals - can get hanged! A big concern remains attacks by loose dogs, or even vandalous humans, because the horse has no chance of escape.
Inner city tethered horses must be a worry, obviously if they got loose, but also because there are so many other people, far greater risks, and build up of horse manure in public spaces isn’t acceptable (although councils don’t chase up the far more hazardous dog-deposits!)
£12,000 is clearly a cash cow / disincentive by the local authority.
 
I know of a few people who tethered horses “back in the day” but it was always in a paddock or their own garden. I don’t know the area but I just can’t fathom thinking that’s a good place to keep your horses. As someone said, anyone could let them go/harm them or they could be attacked by a dog and not be able to get away. You have no idea if theres broken glass or hazards around with it being a public area.

I’m also not a fan of the mental health guilt trip to try and get away with things. If she was that worried about her mental health surely you would keep the horse somewhere safe to reduce risks.
 
One of the replies on the FB post is someone saying that they themselves routinely tether their horses to grass verges 'to desensitise them to traffic'. Not a method I would use, but hey ho...

The explanation that the horses were tethered to the patch of grass so that the children could have easier access to them in the school holidays is also a bit strange. If the horses are normally in a rented field and the owner was visiting the field to check on them, surely the kids could go too? Also, the horses were removed on 10th September and to my knowledge all schools were back in by then.

Quite a few of the people commenting on FB have got the wrong end of the stick; they're saying things like 'why have horses if you can't afford them', when the only reference to 'not affording' something was in relation to the £12k fine. Someone else reckons it's costing them £2k per month to keep their own horses.

Someone says 'it's only grass, better than them starving' (as if it's a huge field) - lots of 'likes' for that. Plus arguments about whether or not tethering is fundamentally cruel ('people have been doing it for years and years...'

Personally, I'd be terrified of someone harming the horses - or the horses harming members of the public (which could turn out to cost a lot more than £12k!)
When we lived in Lancs we had to move our horses on Good Friday, when the area was visited by hundreds of people, because we caught members of the public trying to feed them ice lollies, meat and potato pies, bacon sandwiches, burgers etc etc....
 
Jasmine2023 said:
Keighley is 20 mins away from me. We often see horses tethered on grass verges in Bradford and surrounding areas. Not something I like to see personally.
Click to expand...
Bradford council had a massive purge on tethering several years ago and you really don't see it anywhere near as much as you used to do. Keighley residents pay their council tax to Bradford, so I imagine this woman was never going to get away with it.
 
I don’t think the person needing 12k actually owns the horses. The article says one has already been returned to its owner? It seems more likely they were on loan / or maybe just ‘borrowed’ over time. It sounds a very strange set up.
 
Pearlsasinger said:
Bradford council had a massive purge on tethering several years ago and you really don't see it anywhere near as much as you used to do. Keighley residents pay their council tax to Bradford, so I imagine this woman was never going to get away with it.
Click to expand...
This sounds like the true story!
And a well-publicised £12,000 penalty to help get the message across, altho they probably won’t ever get that amount.
Is the woman trying Facebook to crowd fund, or something?
 
Exasperated said:
This sounds like the true story!
And a well-publicised £12,000 penalty to help get the message across, altho they probably won’t ever get that amount.
Is the woman trying Facebook to crowd fund, or something?
Click to expand...

Apparently she did set up a GoFundMe but it's no longer accepting donations...

gallopingby said:
I don’t think the person needing 12k actually owns the horses. The article says one has already been returned to its owner? It seems more likely they were on loan / or maybe just ‘borrowed’ over time. It sounds a very strange set up.
Click to expand...
It's certainly quite a strange set-up. In the GoFundMe spiel, it does certainly give the impression that she is the owner (and one of the horses is 23 years old!), but I'm honestly not sure.
 
millikins said:
It said the contractor "always tries to issue notice of intent". I would suspect this was probably done as a legal requirement but ignored by the person who tethered the horses.
Click to expand...

She claims very clearly in the GFM stuff that she was not given any notice. On the FB article, she did admit that what she was doing was illegal but said that had she been served with notice she would have moved them straight away. Apparently the horses live in a rented 12 acre field 'in the Crosshills' area (I don't know how far this is from the housing estate) but they were brought to the estate to enjoy some grass. There are certainly some people from the local community who are very much on the 'owner's' side...looks like quite a few kids were involved with the horses!
But it still seems like a bit of a strange story.
 
Red-1 said:
I would imagine this was a long term issue. That space doesn't look suitable for horses, it is a mown area on a council estate, not a rough verge.
Click to expand...
I have a vague recollection of reading about this on a Yorkshire News page, I am not on FB. Afair, the woman was absolutely in the wrong, had somewhere else to keep the ponies and should have known better anyway.
 
gallopingby said:
I think there’s a lot of journalistic licence going on here. It seems the horses were on loan and ‘therapy support?’ Whoever was in charge of the support should surely have been keeping an eye on what was going on. Three horses outside your back door take a lot of looking after, maybe one or two ‘parked up’ for an hour of two whilst the kids have a nice time grooming them but threes a lot and how did they get there given they were then removed by someone employed by the council who left a note? Sounds like a good plan for a fairytale book.
Click to expand...
One was on loan to Jade, one was owned by Jade and the other was owned by me. She was my therapy horse for my mental health issues. I’ve had her 6 years on the 29th and she was very much my best friend. The council did not follow the legal procedure at all when seizing the horses and this is something that is being investigated
 
Nancykitt said:
She claims very clearly in the GFM stuff that she was not given any notice. On the FB article, she did admit that what she was doing was illegal but said that had she been served with notice she would have moved them straight away. Apparently the horses live in a rented 12 acre field 'in the Crosshills' area (I don't know how far this is from the housing estate) but they were brought to the estate to enjoy some grass. There are certainly some people from the local community who are very much on the 'owner's' side...looks like quite a few kids were involved with the horses!
But it still seems like a bit of a strange story.
Click to expand...
We were not given notice and the land is a 30 min drive from the estate. The horses were there a matter of days and were supposed to of been moved sooner however that could not happen as in was in hospital for my mental health
 
millikins said:
It said the contractor "always tries to issue notice of intent". I would suspect this was probably done as a legal requirement but ignored by the person who tethered the horses.
Click to expand...
We were not given notice and this is why it is now being investigated. They did not follow the correct procedure at all and the way the horses were treat (we have cctv) is disgusting
 
gallopingby said:
I don’t think the person needing 12k actually owns the horses. The article says one has already been returned to its owner? It seems more likely they were on loan / or maybe just ‘borrowed’ over time. It sounds a very strange set up.
Click to expand...
One was on loan, one was owned by her and the other owned by me
 
Peglo said:
I know of a few people who tethered horses “back in the day” but it was always in a paddock or their own garden. I don’t know the area but I just can’t fathom thinking that’s a good place to keep your horses. As someone said, anyone could let them go/harm them or they could be attacked by a dog and not be able to get away. You have no idea if theres broken glass or hazards around with it being a public area.

I’m also not a fan of the mental health guilt trip to try and get away with things. If she was that worried about her mental health surely you would keep the horse somewhere safe to reduce risks.
Click to expand...
The mental health part is not a guilt trip. It’s important to what happened because that horse was bought for me to give me a reason to live 6 years ago after I tried to take my life. The horses were supposed to be moved the day before however I was in hospital after another attempt and came out to no horse. Don’t judge when you’ve know idea of the facts.
 
Lolabear said:
We were not given notice and this is why it is now being investigated. They did not follow the correct procedure at all and the way the horses were treat (we have cctv) is disgusting
Click to expand...

This is the bit I don't understand - why did they not give notice? I'm assuming that no-one came tried to telephone/visit in order to discuss it?
The amounts quoted for the 'fines' also seemed excessive. How could they justify this?
As I said in my original post, I felt that there were gaps in the story as reported by the BBC.

I've since seen a photo of one of the horses eating from a huge net of hay so it looks like they weren't just left with the grass.
I really hope it's been sorted out. I just can't think why no notice was given.
 
The article at the bottom of this one is about a miniature pony taken last year and it states £3,700 on the notice left behind. So I'm guessing it's around £4,000 per horse now based on the cost of keeping the horse in the pound going up (hay etc). Actually what are the conditions like at said pound? if the horse was in need of daily mediation would they administer it? Wow that opens a few more questions in my head!

anyway, It looks like a lot of people who have had their ponies taken from Tethers by PPS impoundment's have all said they didn't receive prior warning. Seems to be a pattern.

I'm not a fan of tethering or fly grassing, but I also believe we should all be treated fairly.
 
Nancykitt said:
This is the bit I don't understand - why did they not give notice? I'm assuming that no-one came tried to telephone/visit in order to discuss it?
The amounts quoted for the 'fines' also seemed excessive. How could they justify this?
As I said in my original post, I felt that there were gaps in the story as reported by the BBC.

I've since seen a photo of one of the horses eating from a huge net of hay so it looks like they weren't just left with the grass.
I really hope it's been sorted out. I just can't think why no notice was given.
Click to expand...
This is the thing we don’t get either. No one will give us answers and Bradford council are saying they’ve got nothing to do with it yet the police say otherwise and they’ve admitted to BBC news they had everything to do with it.
 
Tiddlypom said:
Why were the horses left flygrazing in an unsuitable and inappropriate public place in the first place?
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As we’ve already stated it was for the kids to mess around with them for abit as the land is quite far and they don’t see them often. We also go on a lot of outings and camping trips on the horses and carts so it’s easier to rest them closer to home where we can give them regular feeds and it’s easier access for our farrier to do there feet
 
Tiddlypom said:
Why were the horses left flygrazing in an unsuitable and inappropriate public place in the first place?
Click to expand...
Exactly! I don't live in Bradford, although not too far away and I know that several years ago Bradford Council clamped down on fly grazing/tethering on any old bit of grass you can find. It was a terrible problem at the time, with coloured cobs at the side of every main road in the city. No-one should be grazing horses illegally.
 
Pearlsasinger said:
Exactly! I don't live in Bradford, although not too far away and I know that several years ago Bradford Council clamped down on fly grazing/tethering on any old bit of grass you can find. It was a terrible problem at the time, with coloured cobs at the side of every main road in the city. No-one should be grazing horses illegally.
Click to expand...

I know what you mean - but I think it's reasonable to give notice and I still think that the 'fines' seem excessive.
I did some work in Bradford at one stage and I do remember seeing horses tethered on grass verges, so I can see this was a problem back then.

(I actually remember working in a school and looking out of the window of the headteacher's office to see a girl of around 8 years old cantering a little cob, bareback and in a headcollar, onto the school playing fields! She then jumped off and came into school, leaving the horse to graze. The headteacher said 'Don't worry, her dad will come and collect it in about half an hour' - which he did! However, i don't think this is same sort of situation.)


dorsetladette said:
anyway, It looks like a lot of people who have had their ponies taken from Tethers by PPS impoundment's have all said they didn't receive prior warning. Seems to be a pattern.

I'm not a fan of tethering or fly grassing, but I also believe we should all be treated fairly.
Click to expand...
Agreed.
 
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