The fostering program is another fraud, if not in every case and at every SPCA, at least in some cases and perhaps in many.

One recent case this week: A woman offered to foster a dog for a Lower Mainland SPCA. The SPCA barely asked a question, did no home check to see if there was a fenced yard, etc, more or less handed the dog over with undisguised uninterest.

After about six months, during which she did not even get a phone call from the SPCA, the dog started to display some aggression toward the other dog in the house.

The woman asked the SPCA for help in training and was told there was none. When she said she might have to bring the dog back the SPCA hinted that they would kill it.

So she formally adopted the dog from the SPCA and then took it to her municipal pound, one of the ones that has replaced the SPCA in recent years and is so superior to the SPCA that there is no comparison, saying that the dog was a stray she had found.

The SPCA's deceit drives more deceit. The number of times we have been told that someone who has tried to return a dog because of behaviour problems and has been told that the dog will be killed, rather than being offered support and training, is incalculable. This is not animal welfare - it is animal disposal.