A team of pet theft reform campaigners has been nominated for the Petition Campaign of the Year Award at the Your UK Parliament Awards. 

The Petition Campaign of the Year Award celebrates the inspiring people who have used petitions started on Parliament’s petitions website to build support for their campaigns for change. 

This nomination follows a campaign on pet theft reform.

Dr Daniel Allen, from Keele, started the petition ‘Make pet theft crime a specific offence with custodial sentences’ in 2020, and it received more than 143,000 signatures. This followed two earlier petitions, the first from 2018, which was signed by more than 107,000 people, and a second in 2019, which received over 117,000 signatures.

Dr Allen’s campaign was set up in collaboration with Debbie Matthews, CEO of the Stolen and Missing Pets Alliance, and supported by a number of other animal rights campaigners, including: Dr Marc Abraham, founder of the Lucy’s Law campaign to end puppy farming; Freya Woodhall, whose dog Willow was stolen in 2018; Beverley Cuddy, Editor of Dogs Today Magazine; and John Cooper QC. The campaign has also secured support from celebrities including Ricky Gervais and Clare Balding.

A parliamentary debate was held on two of Dr Allen’s petitions in October 2020. Ahead of the debate, campaigners took part in a virtual ‘roundtable’ with Tom Hunt MP, the Petitions Committee member who would be leading the debate, to discuss their concerns. Opening the debate, Mr Hunt backed the campaign’s call for a specific offence to be created, and for the relevant sentencing guidelines to be strengthened.

In May 2021, the Government launched its Pet Theft Taskforce to look into a reported rise in thefts, and Dr Allen was invited to give evidence. The Government then announced in September 2021 that it would make ‘pet abduction’ a specific criminal offence.

The Your UK Parliament Awards judging panel will select the winners shortly, and the full list of nominees and the winner will be announced in due course. The panel includes MPs, members of the House of Lords, campaigning bodies, and past Award winners.