A call for a National Animal Cruelty Offenders’ Register will be made by Professor Andrew Linzey (http://www.oxfordanimalethics.com/who-we-are/director/), a theologian at Oxford University, England and the director of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics (http://www.oxfordanimalethics.com), in an address at St Albans Cathedral on Sunday 30 September.

The Animal Offenders’ register is recommended, along with compulsory empathy training, as a “two stage approach based on Christian principles of repentance and compassion” in response to the many thousands of animal cruelty cases each year.

“For a long time, animal protectionists have been calling for stricter penalties for those convicted of animal abuse. And the usual measures, including fines and community orders, seem a pretty weak-kneed response to those who deliberately inflict cruelty. That is why some are now calling for automatic prison sentences for cruelty and long ones at that. But prison, it seems to me, is not the answer. We know that around 40% of prisoners reoffend and prison frequently dehumanises people. We have to find a way in which the seriousness of animal cruelty can be registered, offenders effectively treated, and animals saved from cruelty. This requires a radical rethink”, argues Linzey.

“Compulsory empathy training for offenders would not be a soft option. Over a period of months, even years, people who are cruel would need to attend classes that require them to confront their own proclivities toward violence and learn to empathise with the suffering of animals.”

“For those who cannot or will not undergo empathy training, or those who do not successfully complete the course, or those who reoffend, then their name needs to be placed on a national register. Those on the register would be forbidden from keeping an animal, or working with them. This register could be consulted by individuals and employers and it would become an offence to sell an animal to such a person or employ them in animal-related work.”

Professor Linzey argues that the low priority given to animal cruelty in the criminal justice system is reflective of a much deeper blindness: “There is a well-established link between animal abuse and human violence supported by hundreds of psychological, medical, sociological, and statistical studies. A world in which animal cruelty goes unchecked is bound to be a less morally safe world for human beings.”