National Points Championship Shootout Charity
The National Foundation for Retired Service Animals is a registered charity (1200949) supporting retired dogs and horses from the police, fire, prison, national crime agency, NHS, and border force services by helping with medical and veterinary bills, which inevitably occur as they get older.
When serving dogs and horses careers end, the financial support they have enjoyed whilst working, including food, kennels or stables, medical and veterinary requirements, training and equipment also comes to an end.
Unfortunately, meaningful insurance is almost impossible to obtain due to their age and training, and even if available, the premiums insurance companies charge for retired animals is incredibly high. This is obviously a worry for handlers who have their own financial obligations, and medical bills can be a real challenge.
Particularly with dogs, In the event that a handler is unable to take on his or her retired dog then members of the public who are suitably experienced with the particular breed are sought to rehome the dog, with no further financial support from the force concerned, as previously mentioned insuring them in retirement is very difficult, and this is where the NFRSA comes in.
We have had 2 retired police dogs, the 1st one Max served with Surrey and Sussex police and was based in Eastbourne, he was retired aged 6 as he had a skin condition and had lost a lot of weight, the powers that be decided that he was not worthy of further investment and he was retired, and as his handler already had 2 dogs he could not take him on and we were asked if we were interested, we went to see him and brought him home.
Over the next few months my wife worked incredibly hard sorting out his diet and treating his skin condition and he came on leaps and bounds, unfortunately we only had Max for 7 months as he was diagnosed with inoperable tongue cancer. After we lost him his handler wrote to us and told us that Max had been the single most successful Police Dog he had handled, and that he had resigned himself to the fact that Max would have been Euthanised had we not taken him on, although his time with us was short we take comfort that his last few months were in a comfortable loving home. Aller veterinary costs were down to us as at the time the NFRSA did not exist.
Moving on a while, brings me to our current dog Fitz, again her handler had other dogs and was unable to keep her, she was retired from the States of Guernsey police early as she has Hip dysplasia and as such we cannot insure her for this condition & if the need arises we will look to the NFRSA for support.
Darrell Collins
