PROPOSALS to “criminalise” people who walk more than four dogs at a time have been criticised as misguided.

Professional dog walkers and dog owners packed into the gallery of a meeting of Darlington Borough Council’s Cabinet after learning of the authority’s consultation to limit the number of dogs that can be taken out by a single person.

Community Safety portfolio holder Councillor Jonathan Dulston told the meeting the authority was proposing to launch a Public Space Protection Order (PSPO) to give it more tools to deal with the issue.

Councillor Jonathan Dulston said the proposals were triggered by dog owners raising safety concerns over packs of dogs, but that he wanted to hear views from a cross-section of the community to help shape the measure.

He said fining dog owners would be “absolutely our last resort”.

Cllr Dulston said: “Hopefully at the end of this consultation process we will have done some meaningful work and the outcome of that will be that we have some broad consensus from our community on what they actually want in these PSPOs.”

The existing Dog Control Order makes it an offence to not pick up dog faeces, not keep a dog on a lead in certain areas, not putting and keeping a dog on a lead when told by an officer and letting a dog enter land where it is not allowed, such as children’s parks, farmland and sports fields.

The proposed PSPO will include these offences, but will also introduce a maximum of four dogs that can be walked at a time and will exclude dogs from all council cemeteries.

David Gray, of Darlington Petpals, told the meeting introducing a PSPO would be a huge step up from the current Dog Control Order.

He said: “Criminalisation is obviously a serious issue which goes with this. As things stand we see no evidence that there is a dog issue within the town. Surely it must be better and more beneficial to work with the dog ownership community in our town and have a coherent strategy that is based around education and improvement rather than just creating fixed penalty notices which will alienate the community overall.”

The meeting was told it was out of control dogs running around off the lead that were the major cause for concern among the dog owning community.

The meeting saw a number of professional dog walkers claim the order could threaten their livelihoods and question the basis of the order. One asked what the council meant in its proposal by stating walkers would need “a reasonable excuse” for having more than four dogs at any one time.

Officers replied they would also consult with other councils and through the consultation process they wanted to seek the views of what residents believed was reasonable.

Jenna Tempest of K9 Companions told the meeting insurance firms had done extensive research into how many dogs it was safe to walk at one time, rather than “plucking a figure from thin air”, and her public liability insurance allowed her to walk six dogs at once.

She said many of her clients specifically wanted their dogs to socialise and take part in group walks.

She said: “It’s a service that’s hugely popular and hugely wanted across the town.”