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It is 2036 and a family has decided it is finally time to get a dog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They want what most people want. A healthy puppy with a predictable temperament, raised in a home and accustomed to children, household noises and ordinary family life. They would like to meet the mother, get to know the breeder and have someone knowledgeable to call if they need help later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But there are very few breeders like that left.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The woman who used to breed an occasional litter of spaniels stopped years ago. .<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The retired couple who preserved one of Britain\u2019s rare native terrier breeds also gave up. Their dogs lived in the house, slept on the sofa and produced a carefully planned litter every few years. But the rules were designed around commercial premises, and adapting their home would have cost more than they could ever recover.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The family searches online instead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are plenty of puppies for sale. There is simply less certainty about where they came from, how they were raised and who will take responsibility for them throughout their lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is not an impossible future. It may be the direction in which we are already travelling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Britain\u2019s love of dogs has not declined. Quite the opposite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
UK Pet Food estimates that there are now approximately 15.5 million dogs in the UK, up from 12.5 million in 2021, with 41 per cent of households owning a dog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet Royal Kennel Club registrations have been falling. In 2025, registrations dropped by 15 per cent on the already worrying figures for 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This creates an extraordinary contradiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Demand for dogs is growing, but the traditional system for recording their ancestry, monitoring inherited health and connecting buyers with identifiable breeders is shrinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The puppies are still being born. They are simply being born increasingly outside the Royal Kennel Club\u2019s world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That matters because a registration is not just a piece of paper. Used properly, a pedigree is a genetic map. It allows breeders to study relationships, monitor inherited conditions and make informed decisions. If fewer dogs are recorded, our ability to understand the population diminishes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Royal Kennel Club\u2019s biggest challenge is not its finances. It is its relevance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If it becomes responsible for registering only a small minority of Britain\u2019s dogs, it cannot credibly remain the sole voice through which government, welfare organisations and legislators understand dog breeding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is an understandable desire to regulate dog breeding more closely. Nobody wants puppy farms, sick puppies or animals bred in unsuitable conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But legislation has consequences, including consequences its authors may never have intended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At present, a breeding licence in England is generally required when someone breeds three or more litters in 12 months, or when their activities are considered to constitute a business. Even this can be interpreted differently by different local authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now imagine registration, inspection or licensing being extended to practically everyone who breeds a single litter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The people most likely to comply are the conscientious ones. They will read every page, worry about every requirement and ask whether their kitchen, utility room, garden or spare bedroom meets standards drafted with larger establishments in mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many will decide not to breed at all. Because often even applying can initiate the interest of the planning department of the council and the image of dog breeding makes neighbours unlikely to support a change of use application that may be needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The danger is that regulation intended to eliminate puppy farming could give large-scale breeding an even greater commercial advantage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Demand will not disappear because responsible people have been frightened away. It will be met by whoever remains willing and able to supply it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That could mean more commercial breeding, more poorly traceable online sales, more imports and more dogs entering Britain under the label of rescue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A puppy born beside the family sofa has advantages that are difficult to reproduce on an industrial scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The breeder notices tiny changes because the puppies are part of daily life. They know the mother intimately. They observe developing personalities and can help match each puppy with the right home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Prospective owners can see where the puppies were born. They can meet the mother and often other relatives. They develop a relationship with the breeder before taking the puppy home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The best breeders also provide a lifetime safety net.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If illness strikes, a relationship breaks down or an owner dies, they help. They may take the dog back themselves or work with their network to find a suitable new home. This quiet, largely unpaid aftercare keeps countless dogs out of rescue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It does not appear in government statistics because the crisis was prevented before it occurred.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We talk constantly about stopping bad breeders. We talk far less about identifying, protecting and multiplying the good ones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The risks are particularly serious for Britain\u2019s native breeds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Royal Kennel Club classifies a native breed as vulnerable when it records fewer than 300 puppy registrations in a year. Its own figures show that the most popular ten breeds account for more than 60 per cent of annual registrations, while many historic British and Irish breeds are disappearing from public view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Only 56 Glen of Imaal Terrier puppies were registered in 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With numbers that small, every thoughtful breeder and every genetically valuable dog matters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If regulation makes breeding more complicated, expensive or frightening, it will not merely reduce the number of puppies. It could remove entire family lines. Gene pools will contract, choices will narrow and some breeds may reach a point from which recovery is impossible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Union of Good Dog People has applied for the ethical breeding and stewardship of Britain\u2019s native dog breeds to be recognised as Living Heritage. That is exactly what it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These breeds are not products to be stored until fashions improve. They survive only because knowledge, dogs and responsibility are passed from one generation of breeders to the next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once that chain is broken, it cannot easily be reconstructed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The same principle must apply to new welfare assessments such as the Innate Health Assessment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No ethical breeder wants dogs to suffer because of exaggerated physical features. But any assessment capable of influencing breeding decisions, licensing or enforcement must be properly validated, consistently applied and supported by robust evidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Julia Carr\u2019s independent appraisal concluded that the IHA is not yet scientifically sound enough to be used as a primary regulatory tool. She raised concerns about the selection of its criteria, unpublished pilot information, the reliability of visual assessment and the possible impact on healthy dogs and already restricted gene pools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A well-designed tool could become part of a broader, breed-specific and evidence-led approach to welfare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A blunt tool, particularly if linked to licensing, could exclude healthy dogs from breeding and make some vulnerable breeds even harder to preserve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Good intentions do not protect dogs from unintended consequences. Evidence, transparency and proportionate implementation do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
None of this means that the Royal Kennel Club is no longer needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In fact, Britain may need a trusted, modern and inclusive canine organisation more than ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But it cannot survive simply by managing decline or speaking only to the traditional dog-show community. It must become relevant to the millions of owners and breeders who currently exist outside its structures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That means making registration meaningful and affordable. It means recording health and ancestry across a much wider dog population, including responsibly bred crosses. It means listening to small breeders before policy is agreed, rather than asking them to adapt after decisions have been made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It also means publicly championing the home breeder who raises puppies well, health-tests thoughtfully, chooses owners carefully and remains responsible for every dog they produce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Royal Kennel Club should be helping government distinguish those people from puppy farmers. It should not allow them to become collateral damage in the pursuit of tougher regulation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The future of British dogs will not be determined only by how many rules we create. It will be determined by who is still willing to breed when those rules are in place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If the answer is predominantly large commercial businesses, overseas suppliers and people prepared to operate outside the law, we will have regulated ourselves into precisely the outcome we claimed to oppose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is another possible future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We could create proportionate regulation that targets poor welfare rather than small scale. We could recognise lifetime responsibility and home rearing as valuable welfare measures. We could build a national register that welcomes responsible breeders instead of making them feel presumed guilty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We could preserve genetic diversity, protect our native breeds and ensure that families can still find puppies raised by knowledgeable people who care deeply about what happens to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I became the Kennel Club\u2019s first Information Officer in the 1980s, it was everyone\u2019s first thought when they thought about dogs. We did not appreciate how valuable it was to be so instinctively trusted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I wrote reports suggesting ways we could evolve and improve. They gathered dust. There was little sense of urgency because we were THE Kennel Club. The first in the world and, we believed, the best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But no organisation can rely forever on what it once represented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Royal Kennel Club can still change. Regulation can still be shaped intelligently. Ethical home breeders can still be recognised as part of the solution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have so many ideas about how we could turn this around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the dogs\u2019 sake, I hope it is not too late.<\/p>\n\n\n\n