Newcastle Dog and Cat Shelter Moving to a Single City Site to Help Manage Financial Pressures

Newcastle’s oldest animal welfare charity is temporarily bringing its operations together at a single site as it looks to manage the significant pressures on its finances caused by the cost-of-living crisis.

Newcastle Dog and Cat Shelter has been reuniting lost pets with their owners and finding loving new homes for animals in need since 1896 and currently operates from two city locations.

It has had a base on Claremont Road since the 1940s and is now choosing to temporarily close this site and provide all its animal care and rehoming services from its larger shelter in Benton.

The Benton site is being prepared for its extended role and with input from specialists, a new intake area is being created to ensure newly-arriving dogs are isolated safely and have a separate area for exercise and training before they move into the shelter’s existing kennels ahead of rehoming.

Newcastle Dog and Cat Shelter successfully rehomes around 1,000 animals each year and needs to raise round £1.2m every year to cover its costs.

It does not receive any Government funding and, because of the current financial crisis, is facing a number of significant issues with a reduction in donations, a steep increase in running costs and an increase in call for its services.

Chris Bray, chief executive of Newcastle Dog and Cat Shelter, says: “We will continue to provide all the animal care and support we already do and will still be there to receive animals that need our help as we have for the last 127 years.

“We’re very attached to Claremont Road and I know many local people will feel the same, particularly the tens of thousands of people who first met their pet when they rehomed an animal from there or were reunited with a lost pet.

“This hasn’t been an easy decision for us, but we have a responsibility first and foremost to the animals in our care now and those that will come to us in the future and, to meet this responsibility, we need to ensure we can weather the current financial pressures.

“Bringing everything together will mean a more streamlined process for dogs newly arrived in our care as well as lower transport and site upkeep costs.

“These are exceptionally tough times for everyone and this is putting real pressure on our donations as well as increasing the number of animals we’re caring for, and we’re also working with local food banks to try and help people struggling to keep their pets.”

The Claremont Road site, which is expected to close in the autumn, has previously been a dog and cat rehoming shelter, and, more recently, provided somewhere to isolate and assess any potential health or behaviour issues in dogs ahead of their move to the charity’s existing Benton Rehoming Centre.

Chris Bray continues: “The facilities at Claremont Road need major updating and investment, so it makes sense to make the move across to Benton now, which will help save us money and will bring the team together on one site.

“As always, the welfare of the animals we care for is at the heart of every decision we take. In 2020, we successfully moved all our cats to the Benton site with great success and doing the same with our dogs will help ensure we’re using our funds as efficiently as possible and making sure the animals are provided with the best care.

“We’re going to mothball the Claremont Road site at this point with a view to returning to it at a later date when, hopefully, we’ll be in a stronger financial position and can consider how best to utilise it for our long-term future.

“A lot of the fixtures at Claremont Road are reusable and we are removing them and repurposing them at Benton. We’ve already had local companies, including White Knight Maintenance and Thompsons of Prudhoe, being incredibly supportive with work including refurbishment of a vet room, creation of socialisation spaces and an animal food preparation area.”

At 10 acres, the shelter’s facilities at Benton are much larger than the 0.5 of an acre at Claremont Road.

Five of the shelter’s team will be moving across from Claremont Road and the charity will continue to monitor the site for security purposes while it is closed via T3 Security who manage security for both sites.

Chris Bray concludes: “People and businesses across the city have always been incredibly supportive of our work but we need help now more than ever, especially through regular cash donations, so we can continue to be here to help the animals and people across the North East when they really need us.

“If any animal lover wants to reach out and see how they can help, we’d ask them to please contact the shelter and we would be very appreciative.”

To support Newcastle Dog and Cat Shelter with a regular donation or with any animal rehoming query please visit: www.dogandcatshelter.com.