Tim Bonner: Revenge of RSPCA entryism

Those who have followed the RSPCA’s troubled history of entryism by the animal rights movement will not be wholly surprised that, at its recent AGM, its members voted for 100 percent plant-based food to be served at RSPCA events. Nor will it come as a shock that there is a level of hypocrisy in this virtue signalling motion in that the RSPCA makes a lot of money from assuring livestock and dairy farmers, egg producers and even the completely unsustainable salmon farming industry.

What might be unexpected, however, is that there are valid reasons to feel sorry for the current leadership of the Society. In the long battle that followed the RSPCA’s politically motivated attack on hunting it has reformed much that was deeply questionable in its constitution and campaigning. After being put in special measures by the Charity Commission it finally addressed many of the governance issues that had made it easy prey for extremists. It removed trustees like Dr Richard Ryder, the self-styled ‘creator of the animal rights movement’ who served for over 30 years continually on the RSPCA council. It significantly reduced the size of that ruling body, clarified its role and appointed a respected and experienced chairman. Most significantly it also finally dropped its addiction to criminal prosecution and has committed to retreating from acting as a prosecutor of first resort. Given the vitriol it threw at the Alliance for suggesting many years ago that the roles of charitable activity, political campaigning, and animal welfare investigation were entirely incompatible with criminal prosecution, this in particular, was a big step.

Yet there remain skeletons in the RSPCA’s cupboard and the most important is its historic approach towards membership. Bizarrely the RSPCA has never actively recruited members, in fact it has sought to suppress membership numbers. Charities that you might think of in the same class, like the RSPB and the National Trust, have memberships of millions. At the end of 2021 the RSPCA had 16,622 members and in its annual report said that “the overall number of members dropped due to a higher number of people cancelling their membership”. It also said that its aim was to “grow our membership and retain more members”. I cannot tell you how many members the Society has now because the 2022 annual report and accounts made absolutely no mention of membership numbers or its target to grow them. It is anyway best to take suggestions that the RSPCA is going to recruit members with a pinch of salt as it is a line that has been repeated over many years. The reality is that you will never see advertisement for RSPCA membership as the last thing the extremists who make up the majority of the RSPCA’s current membership want is for their influence to be diluted by an influx of sane and sensible people. In 2016, as the Society’s membership went into free fall, I was assured by a senior member of staff that ‘a recruitment drive will start this year’, but there was no recruitment drive and membership is now at least 10,000 lower than it was 10 years ago.

This matters because the RSPCA should be a wholly positive influence on animal welfare, but its council and executive remain at the mercy of an unrepresentative and extreme membership. The vegan motion might not matter that much, but it is a warning that just 100 RSPCA members can vote through a policy which challenges the reputation of what should be the most important animal welfare organisation in the country.