Horse Tax - You only have until 30th June... 22 DAYS!!!!

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Michelle73

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Hi all, just a reminder that there's not long to go now before DEFRA's deadline for your response to the Horse Tax.

I wondered if anyone was able to put together a letter of objection that everyone could use and copy and paste to email/post to DEFRA, allowing changes to individuals circumstances.

I'd volunteer but my english isn't great!!!

Here's the email address: RCSharing@defra.gsi.gov.uk
Mark it for the attention of Gavin Ross - he's the person who wrote the consultation letter on the DEFRA Website: http://www.defra.gov.uk/corporate/consult/new-independent-body-ah/index.htm

And for snail mail:
Gavin Ross
Responsibility and Cost Sharing Programme
Animal Health and Welfare
Defra
Area 5E Millbank
c/o Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London
SW1P 3JR


Lets overwhelm DEFRA with our responses!!!

Has anyone started an E-Petition on the Downing St Website yet?
 
Eh?!!

Horse tax!! have I missed something?

Is this one of those things that has been proposed for the future (that never actually happens) or something that is actually going ahead?
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Have I missed a very important post? ....am I the only one that doesn't know anything about it all
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HORSE TAX!! (sorry it's just sinking in now) what the fcuk!
 
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Eh?!!

Horse tax!! have I missed something?

Is this one of those things that has been proposed for the future (that never actually happens) or something that is actually going ahead?
confused.gif


Have I missed a very important post? ....am I the only one that doesn't know anything about it all
crazy.gif


HORSE TAX!! (sorry it's just sinking in now) what the fcuk!

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Ditto all of the above!!
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I have skimmed the defra guidelines, but can't see anywhere that implied a proposed tax on equines, can you point to it specifically please.

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I can't explain in detail because I don't understand it but basically DEFRA are proposing to charge every horse owner £10.50 per horse per year as a way of trying to prevent killer diseases such as TB in cows, blue tongue, foot and mouth etc etc, I suppose African Horse Disease (is it called) in horses. Diseases that would enforce horses to be culled as with foot and mouth.

Why don't you phone DEFRA and talk to someone? They will keep telling you that they are in the "Consultation Process" but many believe that its a done deal and is just another stealth tax.

Sorry don't understand DEFRA'S blurb to tell you much more but all I can say is the we need to do something and quickly. Its been discussed on her before: http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/forums/sh...&PHPSESSID=

Don't let us get stung for even more money, please make sure you have your say. Sadly DEFRA wouldn't allow dates of meetings to go to press release, they only posted the info on their own website - that hits all the horse owners doesn't it?! NOT!!!!!
 
After reading a bit more, if its for good cause then a tenner year is not going to bother me so much but why take it out of horse owners? and will this money really be invested in the prevention of killer diseases...or will it line other peoples pockets I wonder.
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This is what I sent to DEFRA earlier today:






For the attention of:

Gavin Ross
Responsibility and Cost Sharing Programme
Animal Health and Welfare
Defra
Area 5E Millbank
c/o Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London
SW1P 3JR

Dear Mr Ross,

Re. the proposed cost sharing for exotic disease preparedness

I am against this proposal for the following reasons:

1) I do not agree that farmers/livestock keepers should foot the entire bill for this when so many of the factors involved in the spread of disease are out of their control, examples being the endemic bovine TB problem in wild animals, and the lack of inspections of imported animals. I agree that farmers/livestock keepers should play their part but we also need an efficient and effective central control. Do we have this? Looking at Foot & Mouth outbreaks recently, the TB crisis, bluetongue etc. it doesn't appear that we do.

2) Why do you need to add equines to the database? Especially when it will cost you an extra £7 million to set up the equine side of the equine database! In recent years money has been taken for NED and horse passports, and now you expect us to pay for yet another database which in my opinion is completely unnecessary.

3) To keep any animals healthy means spending money on food, veterinary care, and the animals' environment. If the Government takes yet more money in this compulsory insurance it means less money available for the basics of animal care. How exactly is that situation going to help the National Herd? It seems to me that it will only be the law abiding passport holders will be charged. How will you find the non passport holders to charge them your horse tax and enforce them to obtain a passport?

4) Recently I read that Defra had spent £300,000 on a study on the effects of rain on birds and the conclusion was that ducks like water. Look also at the fines imposed by the EU for Defra/RPA mismanagement of the Single Farm Payments. Defra appear to waste a LOT of money on inessentials and a LOT of money is wasted by inefficiency/incompetence. You cannot expect farmers/livestock keepers to be happy about parting with yet more money to such a organisation.

5) Your consultaton process is a joke. Why were the dates of the meetings not published in the press before the meetings happened? I only found out about it by chance, and that was two weeks after the meetings scheduled within reach of my home. Secrecy like this gives the impression of a stealth tax; given the unpopularity of the present government I would have thought a little more openness would have been a good idea. I feel that only posting your information on your website is not a helpful/useful process for those of us with animals which were not regarded as agricultural animals!

I await your response eagerly.

Without predjudice,


FEEL FREE TO USE AS A TEMPLATE BUT MAKE SURE YOU CHANGE THE WORDING TO SUIT YOUR OWN ENDS.
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Yes but first they would have to prove who owned the horse...looks pretty easy to get out of to me...there will always be loopholes.

I am not effing paying it anyway... the cheek... what will they think of next..

perhaps a tax on shoeing for the gas the farrier uses!! or even better a tax for horses dependant on the view from their stable. brick wall small tax, rolling fields bigger tax.....

they can shove it!
 
"Yes but first they would have to prove who owned the horse...looks pretty easy to get out of to me...there will always be loopholes"

all horses have to have a passport now, so it would be relative easy to check up on
 
There are other issues to consider. IMO one of the biggest is that sheep/cattle/pigs etc are agricultural aminals in the main. Horses aren't they have to resolve this classification issue. Currently you need change of use to keep horses on agricultural land which means horses aren't considered agriculture or farm animals. Why then should we have to pay as if they are?

Diseases such as foot and mouth do not affect horses, why should horse owners pay for the clean up?

Then moving onto what diseases do affect horses that maybe we would appreciate their being some system of treatment - currently strangles is not a notofiable disease so we wouldn't benefit there.

The "consultation meetings" were not accessible to many - they were through the week when most of us work, I'd have had to take a day off and travel a couple of hours to Newcastle or York.

Finally, you may not have heard of a disease called Equine Infectious Anaemia. If your horse got this - it would be shot - end of story, no appeal - nothing. We do not have it here. However, if you are a dodgy dealer of horses in a country that does have it, you ship your horses to France for meat. Some dodgy dealer says I know how to make money, we'll tell the stupid brits a sob story... then as there is no requirement for health checks for horses travelling from France to here (And France has recorded cases now) and bingo, horse gets here and transfers EIA to OUR horses.

This arrangement between France, Ireland and the UK was meant to enable racehorses and competing animals to travel freely between the three with no checks. IT WAS NOT MEANT TO BE A WAY TO BRING INFECTED HORSES IN AS "RESCUES" TO PUT OUR ANIMALS AT RISK.

We are being exploited left, right and centre and those soft saps thinking "awwww, these poor french ponies, lets rescue one" are putting all our horses at risk.

I tell you if it gets over here on the back of one of these Franch rescues (carried by lice and ticks etc) there would be a lynch mob out for blood if our horses started being destroyed from catching it.

Thats what we need to get across and I've already written to my MP which I will follow up as well as sending a response to the consultation.
 
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Yes but first they would have to prove who owned the horse...looks pretty easy to get out of to me...there will always be loopholes.

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Wouldn't your name and address be on the passport for all the horses that you own?

A stallion that I used to own had issues with travelling so when I moved area, instead of making him suffer three hours in a lorry I had him gelded and gave him to a private animal sancturay to make sure he would never have to travel ever again. I made some enquiries as to whether or not he was dead or alive and found out that he's still registered in my name with the breed society. I have informed them that I am not the registered keeper but I wonder, would that make me liable for the horse tax?!

Who would pay up if a horse is out on loan?
 
From what I can understand from the DEFRA document, Defra want to use the money to set up a group of people, not ministers, to maintain and carry out an emergency plan if any of the livestock diseases come into the UK.

Hang on. Isn't that what DEFRA are paid to do in the first place?

Like Jay-d, I'm not effing paying either.
 
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What GingerNags said...plus if your horse catches EIA and it has to be compulsory destroyed...guess how much compensation you get??

£1.

Thats it.
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In North America, EIA (or Swamp Fever, as it's also known) does not necessarily mean destruction.

EIA is not curable and cannot be vaccinated against. In order to show an animal or move it between states/provinces, you need to have evidence of a negative Coggins test. This is because an animal can be a carrier without showing symptoms.

A positive Coggins means that the horse must never have contact with healthy horses again. While this often means destruction, there are isolation farms for EIA-positive horses, including even some riding schools!

Just thought I'd clear that up a bit.
 
But if you put it down to personal thoughts, if my horse caught it here from failures in the system - it WOULD have to be destroyed as things stand - my pet that I bred - because of someone elses stupidity. If they changed the rules to be as you say, you could never compete again or hack out in case you came across one that was not infected? Why on earth would we keep a horse then?
 
Have you all written to DEFRA with your views? You really must, rather than just sharing them on here! You see Gingernags, you should have written my letter - you're far more eloquen than I!

Come on folks - everyone who owns a horse, write to DEFRA, make your view count. Spread the word too.
 
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But if you put it down to personal thoughts, if my horse caught it here from failures in the system - it WOULD have to be destroyed as things stand - my pet that I bred - because of someone elses stupidity. If they changed the rules to be as you say, you could never compete again or hack out in case you came across one that was not infected? Why on earth would we keep a horse then?

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I agree, it's not ideal, and it's awful that people manage to circumvent the rules like that and endanger other peoples' horses. But if I had a horse that tested positive, and I had a chance for it to go to a good home and live a normal life with others of its kind, I'd take that chance, I think, even though it meant losing the horse.
 
I sent a letter to my MP a few weeks ago about it, but am going to follow up and include something about the consultation too - its not fair on ordinary horse owners that it was so difficult to get to the meetings.

I wish they'd get it through their heads that we are not all toffs with more money than sense that can take time out from sitting on our country estates to attend meetings.

No we are nurses and teachers and mothers and secretaries and grooms that can't just drop work and committments to travel for hours to badly publicised meetings.

But then maybe thats what they hoped and they could sneak this in.

Reading the summary document, it doesn't even mention horses - and keeps talking about agriculture and farming - which horses aren't included in. And it mentions diseases that don't affect horses. And then the amount per pig/cheep/cow are under £5!!! So they think we should pay double the amount for a cow for things that don't even affect horses?

If they reclassify horses as agricultural so that owners/riders/grooms qualify for agricultural tied properties etc, and stop the need to have planning permission and change of use for riding and grazing horses, OK we'll count them as agricultural animals. Then as someone said make sure EVERYONE has to have their animals passported and microchipped - no exemptions for so called ethnic minorities - and wipe out theft with an accurate scanning and ownership database to rule out re-passporting and ensure every horse leaving the country is scanned to stop them being shipped abroad - then I'd be more interested.

And finally close the loopholes for these gits in France putting us at risk of EIA and stop the dross of the horse world being dumped here, and then fine, I'll pay my £10 a year! And NOT BEFORE!
 
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What GingerNags said...plus if your horse catches EIA and it has to be compulsory destroyed...guess how much compensation you get??

£1.

Thats it.
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In North America, EIA (or Swamp Fever, as it's also known) does not necessarily mean destruction.

EIA is not curable and cannot be vaccinated against. In order to show an animal or move it between states/provinces, you need to have evidence of a negative Coggins test. This is because an animal can be a carrier without showing symptoms.

A positive Coggins means that the horse must never have contact with healthy horses again. While this often means destruction, there are isolation farms for EIA-positive horses, including even some riding schools!

Just thought I'd clear that up a bit.

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So.....pretty much, in the UK, unless your horse lives alone in the middle of no-where, with no chance of a non-infected horse passing by the field....then its pretty much destruction then? Cos if you keep your horses on a livery yard you are shafted.
 
As the rules currently stand in the UK, you would have no choice, your horse would be destroyed and you will get £1 compensation NOT insured value (if you read the small print of your insurance it will most probably say that it will not pay up if the animal was subject to a destruction order as a result of a notifiable disease).

Like others on here I am all for clarification, registration and tax if it applies to ALL horses aand it means our national herd is protected by more stringent border controls. It will be interesting to see if horses are going to be re-classified as agricultural animals (with all the planning implications that will involve).
 
I went to one of their 'consultation meetings' and i think it is a forgone conclusion that it will come in, in 2012, BUT when i asked how they were going to collect the 'tax' when there are still so many horses without passports they fobbed me off with Defra speak, but basically they didn't know, so i wouldn't worry because they are talking about self declaration once you ar e registered [once again]. They are creating yet another department [jobs for the civil servants!] but they are disguising it as health and welfare of animals, and they are very worried about African Horse sickness and we should all contribute to eradicating it.
What I want to know from the experts out there is where is AHS now, how could it spread to this country and does there have to be certain weather conditions in this country [as per blue tongue in sheep where the climate has to be right for the midges to survive]
Love the letter, we do need to make our voices heard, and we need to bamboozle the scientific experts with some very awkward questions. It's a tax on animals of every kind, pets such as dogs, cats etc wil be next because they are also worried about Rabies. be warned.
 
If any of you have fully read the proposal you will know that the tax that they are looking to impose only applies to livestock ie: cattle, sheep, pigs etc.

HORSES WILL NOT BE INCLUDED IN THE PROPOSAL as they are classed as domesticated animals!!!!
 
Sorry Jo Indiana I went to the defra meeting and they are going to be included, for the reasons i stated - AHS. They are including anything that might be susceptable to exotic deseases, including maybe rabies
 
Werll the original proposal that was brought out towards the end of last year clearly stated that horses would not be included.

Im not sure if the proposal has since been amended to include them etc but even still the proposal has not been passed and rolled out etc, this is something that would take between 12-18 months and even then if a certain percentage of people appeal against the decision it has to be looked again. They cannot just impose something like this over night. The administration alone would take a very long time to organise and arrange plus registration of all horses and owners etc.

In short i dont think we have anything to worry about for the next 2 years or so.
 
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