Dogs Against Drugs campaign exceeds a thousand signatures 

Dogs Against Drugs handler Megan Grant with Bravo. Photo: Dave Donaldson

More than one thousand people have backed The Shetland Times petition to give more funds to Dogs Against Drugs from the proceeds of crime.

This comes one month after this newspaper started the campaign and a week after we launched our fundraiser.

The campaign has called for the Scottish government to provide more funding to the charity — and others like it across the country — from the ill gotten gains of criminals.

Public figures from across the isles backed our campaign including SIC community safety and resilience chairman Da Flea, council convener Andrea Manson and former Orkney and Shetland MP Jim Wallace.

Around £120,000 a year is needed to maintain the charity and it only has around three-quarters of that in place for 2024/25.

Over the last five years, Dogs Against Drugs has run at a loss to cover fuel, dog food, wages for two handlers and vet bills.

In the last week our campaign has also gathered £560 (including Gift Aid) through our online fundraising effort. Council convener Manson was the first to donate £50 through this method.

An anonymous person also kindly donated a generous £200 which was handed in at The Shetland Times Bookshop on Wednesday.

Other generous donations have been given in recent weeks from Da Flea and David Henry of DH Marine. Both of these went directly to the charity.