'The enforcement of the measures is going to be key'. That's according to IFA's national sheep chairman, Kevin Comiskey, who was responding to this morning's effort to better regulate dog ownership.
Speaking to Northern Sound, the Co Leitrim sheep farmer says licencing and microchipping is also necessary, as is the creation of a national database where the details of all dogs in the country can be stored.
Mr Comiskey says human behaviour and responsible ownership are vital to ensuring that dogs are under control at all times. He added that human behaviour was at the heart of the assault on a farmer in Co Wicklow last week after he tried to prevent a walker from bringing dogs onto his land.
"That farmer opened up a walkway on his farmland to a beautiful area in Wicklow and all he asked the people to do was not to bring dogs up because there was sheep lambing and different things happening."
"Then, to turn round and be quite abusive to him and to assault him, on his own property - people think that they can just go in an walk all over farmers. They have a sense of entitlement and that is where the messaging has to get out; we see it all the time here in Leitrim and right up across the mountains in Cooley - they let the dogs off the leads and let them run willy nilly.
