The applicant had five ponies seized from her in December 2014 due to the ponies being in distress and had made applications for judicial review to the Minister of Agriculture for their return, who had determined that she was not fit to care for the ponies. The Applicant unsuccessfully sought judicial review of that decision and appealed the judicial review application on the basis that the Minister had failed to address her submission that she had not been given an opportunity to alleviate the ponies’ distress prior to their seizure and that therefore their seizure was “illegal”. The original judicial review decision can be found here.
The Court examined the evidence from the initial seizure. Inspectors investigated the applicant’s treatment of the ponies 15 times over a 3-year period. A complaint from the applicant’s veterinarian precipitated the final inspection leading up to the seizure, where During seven ponies appeared to be underweight with five of those seven in very poor body condition with hips, spine and ribs visible despite having their winter hair coat. Five of the ponies had no food and the other two had only small scraps of hay.
The decision to seize the five ponies in the most distress but leave the other two with the applicant with directions for proper care was reviewed at the time with the applicant. This constituted reasonable effort on the part of the inspectors to obtain cooperation of the owner, which is all that is required under the Animal Protection Act in which the object and purpose is to protect animals who have been neglected by people who are charged with their care.
The Court of Appeal affirmed that the previous Court had undertaken the proper standard of review of reasonableness. The appeal was dismissed and the reviewing judge’s decision was affirmed, with costs on appeal to the respondent.