The Kennel Club has, for more than a century, been the governing body of all things pedigree dog. They are seen, rightly or wrongly, as the bastion of the illustrious side of the canine world. From breeding and care to showing and even welfare.

For generations, British dog owners have looked upon the Kennel Club as a source of knowledge, experience and authority. At its core, the Kennel Club is a breed registry. Nothing more, nothing less.

In 2009 though, the organisation stretches into far more than just registering pedigree paperwork. The Kennel Club lends its name to products, pet insurance, affiliate schemes and accreditation programs. The provide guidelines on good practice to breeders and in 2004 they set up the Kennel Club Accredited Breeder Scheme. Four years on we ask, is it working?

The Accredited Breeder Scheme (ABS) was set up to enable potential dog owners to ‘buy with confidence’ from Kennel Club approved breeders. By being a Kennel Club approved breeder, one would naturally assume that you’d need to be experienced, have a proven track record for producing healthy dogs of good temperament and at the very least, to be responsible enough to perform all health tests relevant to your breed of choice.

The scheme’s good intentions are one thing, but dig deeper and we find there are some rather worrying issues when it comes to assessing the robustness of the standards required to be accepted onto the scheme.

To be a member of the Kennel Club Accredited Breeder Scheme (ABS), you don’t even need to have bred a dog at all. You just need to sign up to the scheme, which you can do via the Kennel Club’s website, pay your fee and hope that you’re never suspected of doing anything dodgy.

The ABS was set up in 2004 and has been steadily gathering momentum and members. The emphasis appears to be on recruiting new members, which the Kennel Club claims meets their aims of promoting responsible breeding to as many people as possible. The Kennel Club claims that since the inception of the ABS there is now a benchmark for new dog owners to judge good breeders. Whilst this appears to be a claim that only breeders of high repute are included in the scheme, that is not true.

It is remarkably easy to become an accredited breeder, and this is deliberate. The Kennel Club encourage and defend this ease of accessibility to ensure that nobody is excluded from benefiting from the scheme, but the reality is that the Kennel Club would simply benefit from more people joining the scheme.

Those familiar with the European Convention for the Protection of Pet Animals will know that responsible breeding would have emphasis placed on breeder responsibility as part and parcel of the UK signing up, but as yet we are one of only a few European nations that haven’t joined up. Turkey, Azerbaijan Bulgaria and the Czech Republic are all members and the UK is notable for its absence.

Supporters of the UK’s membership of the Convention are concerned that schemes such as the ABS are distracting the government, DEFRA in particular, from focusing on our need to sign up to the convention.

Supporters of the Convention have long suspected that it is in the Kennel Club’s interests for the UK not to become members and that there is a conflict of interest between the Convention’s aims and the Kennel Club’s aims, which may have caused the Kennel Club to set up the ABS as a perceived viable and workable alternative to the Convention.

This suspicion is raised when the KC states:

“If we cannot show that we are capable of responsible self-regulation, in a way that will satisfy our doubters, then government will intervene and regulate for us.”

The ABS is used by the Kennel Club to identify and promote the services of dog breeders it deems to be worthy of receiving their endorsement. However, despite appearing to be a sufficient alternative to the Convention, K9 Magazine was alarmed to discover some rather worrying discrepancies between the concept of being a good dog breeder and the requirements for membership of the ABS. The most unusual one being that a person doesn’t need to be a dog owner to gain membership of this scheme.

Not only can someone who isn’t a dog owner become an accredited breeder with the Kennel Club’s seal of approval, but people who have never before bred a litter can also gain membership. The Kennel Club neatly sidestep this gaping chasm of logic by declaring that the scheme is set up to govern and guide any breeder that seeks the support of their organisation. There are myriad other issues with the scheme which are causing concern for many who’d like the government to reconsider its position on us joining the Convention. They include

Elbow scoring is not a requirement for breeders that are accredited, it is merely a recommendation – Meaning that breeders who are not concerned about their dogs passing on genetic defects such as elbow dysplasia are still accredited by the Kennel Club.

Only a small percentage of breeders that are accredited are subject to home inspections – Meaning that the vast majority of accredited breeders are operating outside of the scrutiny of the organisation that is accrediting them.

The scheme was set up quickly as a response to the political agenda surrounding the welfare of dogs – Meaning that the ABS came into existence as a reactive measure for political reasons rather than a pro-active measure for welfare reasons.

How the Accredited Breeder Scheme Works

Breeders can become accredited by sending off payment and an application form which is downloadable from the Kennel Club’s website. Prior to acceptance of an application, the Kennel Club will check the Kennel Club record of the candidate.

The scheme is self governing, with the Kennel Club carrying out home inspections only on the advice of breed club members who consider a scheme member to be inappropriate for membership. According to the Kennel Club, the scheme is not in place to highlight the elite dog breeders, but to set guidelines for breeders to adhere to in order for them to function as good breeders under Kennel Club definitions. The Kennel Club is keen for as many breeders as possible to join the scheme.

The main benefit for breeders that are part of the scheme is that they can advertise themselves as accredited, which in theory gives dog buyers an incentive to use their services, which suggests that commercial interests are the main driving force for dog breeders to sign up and become members of the scheme. Accredited breeder have prioritised access to Kennel Club health and advice literature – meaning that they are given an advantage over non-accredited dog breeders who may also be seeking advice.

We spoke to the Kennel Club’s Press Officer Heidi Ancell, about their motivations for setting up the Accredited Breeder Scheme.

The KC only recommends certain health tests rather than insisting on them. Given the well established importance of health testing, why is the KC not insisting on health checks from the breeders whom the KC are publicly endorsing?

Health screening requirements under the Accredited Breeder Scheme (ABS) are currently restricted to tests where an official Kennel Club scheme is in place and where the results can be independently verified. Fulfilment of requirements is checked automatically at the time of registering a litter bred by an Accredited Breeder, from data stored on our registration database. As we can only record health results of official Kennel Club schemes on this database, we are currently restricted to only using official schemes as ABS Requirements.

Breed specific recommendations are made where there is either no official scheme in place yet or where there may not yet be enough evidence, or research or uptake of screening, to suggest that a problem is significant in a specific breed. We recognise, for example, that some breed clubs run health schemes and play an important role in the promotion of health in a breed. One such example is the Bulldog Breed Council Health Certificate. We make these types of schemes ABS Recommendations to help raise the profile of such schemes. Accredited Breeders are strongly encouraged to follow Recommendations for their chosen breeds.

We are constantly updating and reviewing the list of ABS Requirements and Recommendations. It is likely that once an inherited disease is proven to exist, a test for it has been developed and an official scheme can be adopted, it will then be added to the list of ABS Requirements, after consultation with the relevant breed clubs.

It is quite clear that the Kennel Club are confident that they are doing enough to ensure that the breeders that they endorse through the scheme are acting responsibly. But they are judging breeders by their own, flawed standards. The Kennel Club are yet to accept that their methods of breeding are resulting in poor health and genetic weaknesses throughout many pedigree breeds. By not insisting on every dog that is bred by an ABS breeder being elbow scored, the Kennel Club are ignoring a huge problem.

Why is the Kennel Club so keen to work with DEFRA to ensure that the world of dogs is self-regulated when that self regulation has resulted in so many purebred dog breeds being riddled with genetic health problems due to in-breeding?

KC – We firmly believe that those who understand and are involved with dogs are far better placed to make decisions involving dogs than central governments. One only has to look at the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 often described as the worst piece of legislation to go through the House of Commons, to understand that this is the case. The introduction of the Accredited Breeder Scheme is the first real opportunity that the Kennel Club has had to work with breeders to begin to define basic responsible breeding practices and drive improvements.

The Kennel Club is often criticised for its arrogance and here we may be able to see why. Assuming that they are the best placed people to decide how to breed dogs they are reinforcing the widely held belief by many that there is no alternative to Kennel Club approved methods. By using the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 as an example of the Government’s inadequacy when bringing in dog legislation and policy, they should keep in mind that they initially supported the Act and have only recently back tracked on this position.

Why are only a handful of accredited breeders subject to home inspections? Shouldn’t the Kennel Club ensure that every breeder it accredits is subject to the same scrutiny?

KC – On joining the scheme every member of the Accredited Breeder Scheme agrees to allow a breeder advisor access to visit their premises. It is clearly important that we prioritise certain visits and our initial focus has been on those who are breeding on a more frequent basis. Occasionally we have complaints about an Accredited Breeder and we ensure that these too are dealt with as a matter of urgency. However we also arrange randomly selected visits to ensure that good practices as outlined in the scheme are followed.

In addition to breeder advisor visits, we ask all puppy buyers for feedback and if we don’t receive that feedback we check up on the breeder. The Kennel Club receives hundreds of feedback forms from new puppy buyers each month.

K9 – Again, it appears that the ABS is woefully inadequate at fulfilling its own brief. By only relying on complaints to highlight accredited breeders that fall below the standards set out in the ABS, the Kennel Club are leaving the door open for bad breeders to not only get away with poor breeding practice, but to promote themselves using the Kennel Club’s trusted name. Our research suggests that the best UK breeders do not require or want the accreditation that the ABS provides. Shouldn’t the Kennel Club be striving to be associated with those that are producing healthy, successful dogs rather than simply trying to accredit as many breeders as possible?

It is certainly true that many responsible breeders are probably fulfilling most of the Schemes requirements and will probably not personally benefit from membership of the scheme. But it is important that we attract all responsible breeders into the scheme so that we can identify to the puppy buying public which breeders have declared that they will follow the basic good practice and achieve one of our ultimate aims of forcing irresponsible breeders out of business. We are currently progressing a number of initiatives aimed at encouraging greater numbers of highly experienced breeders into the scheme, some of which are proving remarkably successful. We would also point out that we do in fact have some very high profile breeders on the Scheme, many of whom have been members for some time.

Perhaps one of the main flaws of the ABS is that those that have built their own reputation as good, responsible breeders are often excluded from things such as the ABS because they do not share the Kennel Club’s view of responsible breeding. The scheme appears to set out guidelines which have proven to be unnecessary whilst not including guidelines that many good breeders would consider essential, such as elbow scoring.

It appears that the KC is far more concerned with the volume of breeders registered to the ABS rather than the quality of breeders, making statements about the need for more breeders to become accredited rather than focusing on having less breeders who meet far superior standards. How can the KC justify a policy that looks from the outside as though they are simply trying to impress DEFRA with a figure to show how many breeders are now accredited?

KC – We have not set targets on the number of breeders that we want to attract into joining the Accredited Breeder Scheme and it is certainly about quality not quantity. However we have purposefully made joining the scheme a simple process as we feel it is important that no responsible breeder should be excluded and any breeder can apply. Remaining on the scheme is more challenging of course and only those breeders who continue to comply with the requirements and operate within the spirit of the scheme will endure.

Remaining on the scheme is only going to be challenging for those that are inspected or reported. The ABS as yet has no way of guaranteeing that every scheme member will be subject to the same level of scrutiny and therefore some breeders we have spoken to believe the ABS is serving a negative purpose as many quality breeders have accused it of being a platform to sell puppies by average or sub standard breeders. As a result, they fear that many quality breeders simply don’t want or need accreditation and thus are missing from the scheme all together. What is your response to this?

KC – We have already answered this question in outlining what we are doing to encourage quality breeders onto the scheme, what we have achieved and why we feel this is important. Regarding the supposition that it is being used as a platform to sell substandard puppies I would point out that the aim of the scheme is precisely the opposite and where there is misuse and breeders don’t meet the required standards we have procedures in place to investigate and – where appropriate –remove them from the scheme, as previously outlined.

‘How can the KC accredit a breeder who has never bred a litter of puppies or even owned a dog before, does this not make a mockery of the scheme?”

KC – We check that every applicant does own a dog of the specified breed at the time of applying. If that dog hasn’t had a litter it is – in our view – better that the scheme remains open to both inexperienced as well as the experienced breeders and vital that those new to breeding dogs start out the right way, and embrace good breeding principles from the very beginning. Indeed, those new to breeding have more to learn, and if they start out as they mean to go on then that can only be to everyone’s benefit.

Can you tell our readers how many people have been removed from the scheme directly by the Kennel Club?

We are confident that we have dealt with areas of concern appropriately and will continue to do so. Where possible, we try to work with breeders and encourage improvements as we believe that this is in the long term best interests of the dogs.

Can you put a figure on it?

KC – The Kennel Club takes all complaints seriously and carries out breeder advisor visits to monitor the quality of those who are on the scheme. To date, 49 breeders have been suspended.

Any Accredited Breeder that is suspended can apply to have their suspension removed, if and when the reasons for the suspension have been addressed. A further breeder advisor visit may be necessary to ensure full compliance with the scheme’s requirements.

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The effort to bring dog breeding into the world of some form of regulation is a worthy one. One that should be applauded and supported. However, it would appear that, as with many good intentions, the proof of the concept is in its implementation and enforcement.

The Kennel Club Accredited Breeder Scheme should be a force for good. But without rigourous enforcement and demanding standards of the very, very highest order, there is a serious risk that bad breeders can be tacitly ‘endorsed’ by affiliation with such a well recognised and trusted ‘brand’ as the Kennel Club. This is undeniable. The general public looks to a scheme bearing the Kennel Club logo and the word ‘accreditation’ and they will put their faith in standards.

One must question whether the puppy buying public is fully aware of how high, or indeed low to give it another slant, the actual standards are to become accredited? It is entirely conceivable that the buyer of a puppy could have more canine experience than the accredited breeder, which seems ludicrous.

Some would argue that something is better than nothing. The danger with this position is that low standards receive high endorsement and as such, the truly top class breeders will opt out.

Why, after all, would a genuinely illustrious breeder who insists on health screening of all of their stock (rather than recommended health screening) need or indeed want to be accredited? Especially if they are being accredited alongside breeders who are not health testing as is their choice if certain tests remain recommended rather than compulsory.

One thing is for sure, dog breeding standards need to be vastly improved if the UK wants to catch up with the progressive nations such as Germany, Finland and many other Scandanavian countries who place far, far greater emphasis on the need to health test breeding stock and efficiently regulate against rogue dog breeders. As it stands, the UK has some catching up to do.

The jury is very much out on whether the Kennel Club’s well intentioned scheme is the answer to our problems. In it’s current format, the evident weaknesses of the scheme would suggest there is still much work to be done.

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Related posts:

1. The Kennel Club Accredited Breeder Scheme – Has it Failed Already?
2. Kennel Club Announces Breed Changes to Accredited Breeder Scheme
3. Kennel Club ‘Deeply Concerned’ About Conditions of Accredited Breeder’s Dogs
4. 7 Questions For Dog Breeders and The Kennel Club
5. Former Kennel Club Accredited Breeder Is Jailed for Neglect of 99 Dogs