A NATIONAL zoo inspectorate must be created to protect animals, the actress and wildlife campaigner Virginia McKenna has said after almost 500 animals died at Dalton Zoo.

The Born Free Foundation, the charity McKenna founded after she starred in the 1966 film Born Free, is also calling for a ban on importing elephants to the UK, The Times has reported.

The charity has produced a 15-point plan for improving the welfare of wild animals kept in captivity in the UK.


Virginia McKenna. Picture: Maria Slough Photography Born Free is calling for a full-time centralised zoo inspectorate. Licensing is currently handled by local authorities.

The charity wants the government to fulfil its manifesto pledge to ban wild animals in travelling circuses. It is also calling for a ban on selling or keeping primates as pets and a ban on the import, sale and keeping of wild-caught mammals, reptiles and amphibians as pets.

Zoos, it says, should lose the legal exemption that allows them to “pinion” birds, where their wings are cut to prevent flight.

McKenna, 85, said: "We have fought tirelessly for 33 years for the millions of neglected, overlooked, unprotected, and mistreated wild animals kept in zoos, travelling circuses and as 'pets'.

"Yet significant problems remain on our doorstep here in the UK: it still remains legal to purchase and keep wild animals as pets, to repeatedly transport them for performance in travelling circuses, and it is shockingly clear that many zoos in the UK are substandard, failing to meet even meagre minimum requirements.

"Governments have the power to change this and they must take these issues seriously."

An inspection of Dalton Zoo in January revealed animal welfare standards within an area managed directly by Mr Gill were poor and had resulted in the deaths of a series of exhibits.

A post mortem report also revealed nearly 500 animals died in just four years because of inappropriate animal husbandry and harrowing conditions.

The causes included emaciation, exposure and infighting within overstocked pens.

Staff from the Born Free Foundation - a charity that campaigns for the rights of captive animals - said they witnessed animals exhibiting 'stereotypic behaviour' when they visited Dalton Zoo.

The organisation was one of two to address members of Barrow Borough Council's licencing committee earlier this month on concerns for the welfare of animals kept at the attraction.

Katie Richards, of Born Free, urged the committee to reject an application for a zoo licence made by the site's owner David Gill.

Ms Richards said: "I was appalled at the apparent mismanagement of the zoo and the animals.

"I am also deeply concerned Barrow Borough Council has allowed it to deteriorate over several years.

"There are fundamental issues that cannot be fixed by awarding a new zoo licence."

South Lakes Safari Zoo is operating without a licence after Barrow Borough Council bosses refused to renew the existing permit held in the name of the attraction's owner, David Gill.

A formal closure notice was also issued by members of BBC's licencing regulatory committee after they ruled the zoo had failed to comply with a series of direction orders put in place last year.

However, the zoo can remain open for 28 days pending an appeal of the licence refusal by Mr Gill.

Cumbria Zoo Company Ltd, of which Mr Gill is not a director, hopes to secure its own zoo licence from Barrow Borough Council in May.