INTERVIEW - New RSPCA chief puts WTO in her sights
Date: 31-Oct-02
Country: UK
Author: John Joseph
As Jackie Ballard prepares to take up her new job on November 4, the former Member of Parliament has promised to bring a more global approach to the RSPCA.
"Animal welfare knows no boundaries," the 49-year-old Ballard told Reuters in an interview. "I want the WTO not to treat them just as animals, but as sentient beings."
The RSPCA is unhappy that the WTO makes no distinction as to how a product is manufactured - it treats a battery-produced egg in the same way as one laid by a free-range hen.
Moreover two European Union laws - a ban on the sale of cosmetic products tested on animals and on the import of certain furs caught using leghold traps - have not been implemented over fears about incompatibility with WTO rules.
So early next year, Ballard plans to bring together other international animal welfare groups in a bid to coordinate a more organised approach to lobbying of the WTO.
While she tries to push the issue of animal welfare up the WTO agenda, her domestic in-tray is also full.
Her anti-hunt activist past has drawn fire from the Countryside Alliance, an interest group that supports field sports, despite the RSPCA's long-standing opposition to hunting.
It has also raised the hackles of leading RSPCA member Jacqueline Denham, who resigned from the charity's 24-strong council after Ballard beat former Railtrack chief executive Steve Marshall to the 90,000 pounds-a-year ($139,300) post.
All of which is par for the course for Ballard - the first woman to head the RSPCA is a veteran of the bruising demands of public life.
Her past opposition to hunting saw her receive a death threat and a pro-hunt advocate left a dead sheep on a golf course with her name round its neck.
PERSONAL VENDETTA
"When those things happened I did ask myself why am I putting myself through this," she said, insisting she is not pursuing a "personal vendetta" against hunt supporters.
Fox and stag hunting is about social control, Ballard believes.
"It's about a feudal serfdom that exists in this country and that's why members of the hunt are called Masters and servants."
Touting her political contacts, Ballard plans to bring a "sharper edge" to the charity's campaigning work and also wants to rebrand the society to attract younger volunteers, to prevent them joining fringe direct-action groups.
Her track record in animal welfare is lengthy. As well as opposition to hunting, she also co-sponsored a fur-farming bill that led to a government ban on fur farms in the UK and supported a ban on battery cages.
"I care passionately about incidents of inhumanity, be it to people or animals," said Ballard, who adds that whenever she has owned a cat, it has always been a RPSCA one. "Generally people that are cruel to animals are also cruel to people."
The RSPCA last year investigated 123,156 complaints of cruelty and found homes for over 90,000 pets.
But it lost nearly nine million pounds in 2001 and is projected to lose seven million pounds this year due to the falling stock market.
Ballard is fully aware of the challenges ahead. She spent "a middle-aged gap year" studying in Tehran but a half-finished dissertation on the Internet's impact on Iran is now gathering dust as she takes on what she calls "the biggest job of my life".