Know Your Rights

If you need a solicitor specialising in this field, please ask, and we can recommend one from our panel of approved solicitors. Based on our experience and what we have been told, our understanding of the legal position is as follows.

When someone abandons horses on your land or fly grazes them without your permission, the situation is the same as when someone leaves goods on your land. You become what is known as an involuntary bailee, and you are responsible for those animals until they are either reunited with their owner or the responsibility is passed to someone else.

The British Horse Society guides this subject if you want to do this yourself; however, it can become very complicated. If you go down this route, you will need to put the appropriate risk assessments in place, arrange for horse transport, arrange for insurance, arrange for a vet report, arrange for people to round the horses up, security, arrange any movement orders, have microchipped and passported and finally find a place to rehome the horse/s. Alternatively, you can use a professional equine bailiff company like The Horse Bailiffs, who will manage the whole process for you legally and have rehoming arrangements in place; they also have experience in these matters.

On the British Horse Society website, they explain YOUR RESPONSIBILITY.

“You are responsible for any injury caused to the horse(s) while on your land. You are also responsible for providing adequate and appropriate food and water, shelter, and veterinary care under sections 4 and 9 of the Animal Welfare Act 2006. However, you cannot be held liable for any injury or neglect caused to the horse(s) before it came to be on your land. It is advisable to call a vet when the horse first appears on your land so that the horse’s condition may be checked and recorded.”

If you have already served notice it will not be necessary to serve again, however, either way, a risk assessment visit is essential as well as a horse welfare assessment which must be done before any horse can be moved.

The best practice is to check the notices and welfare of the horses again after two days, which you could do or, for a fee, we can do for you. Our bailiff can then, if required, provide and complete a witness statement in any legal dispute.

The horse/s can be detained on or off-site immediately

We recommend that to lessen your liability, they be moved ASAP, but we can serve a notice first and wait to see if they are moved by their owners if it is what you require.

If they are not moved or not claimed after being moved, then after 96 hours (not including Saturdays and Sundays) their ownership reverts to the landowner.

We can then provide a disposal service, the costs of which vary depending on what you require us to do with them, their sex, condition, and the risk associated with the particular case. A full quote will be given and agreed upon before further action starts.

The standard procedure would be as follows.

• Conduct a full Health & Safety risk assessment if required. Serve the required 96-hour notices.
• If you want the moving team to arrange for a horse welfare expert to check the horses are safe to transport
• Detain the horses on or off-site, depending upon instructions.
• Inform relevant authorities.
• Photograph horses and notices in place.
• We will then deal with any email enquiries that result from the notices.
• If horses are not removed /claimed after the statutory time limit, their ownership reverts to the landowner.
• You may then instruct us further, and we will arrange for the horses to be removed from the site or, if already moved, to be either moved to a new owner, stored in livery, given to a horse charity, sold at public auction, or, in some cases, humanely destroyed.
• Serve the required 96-hour notices.
• Conduct a full Health & Safety risk assessment – check the horses have adequate food and water.
• Detain the horses on-site or, if instructed, remove them to a safe location.
• Inform relevant authorities.
• Photograph horses and notices in place.
• Our bailiffs will then deal with any telephone calls that come as a result of the notices.
• The landowner regains ownership if the horses are not removed after the statutory time limit.
• The landlord may then instruct us further, and we will arrange for the horses to be removed from the site to either a new owner, livery storage, given to a horse charity or, in some cases, to be humanely destroyed.