Every year the Chestnut Cat Sanctuary has inspections by the Local Council licensing Authority and the RSPCA, to ensure our pens and buildings are properly maintained and that the cats & kittens, while in our premises, receive the highest care in both loving attention and, just as importantly, in a safe and healthy environment. They have to ensure we adhere to a code of practice that adequate temperatures are maintained, the risk of spreading disease is minimised, the premises are hygienic, and the list goes on.

On the 27th. March the RSPCA carried out their annual inspection and we hope that in due course we will be given a clean bill of health.

These visits are not seen as a nuisance visit because they do give us the latest good housekeeping advice, and after all, we are only interested in the welfare of the cat. It was found, for instance, one of the areas temperature gauges was malfunctioning, so it brought it to our attention and took 2 minutes to fix. They also took the opportunity to inspect our annual Council License issued by the local Welfare animal officer. They are there also to protect our managing local RSPCA branch , ensuring the cats and kitten adoptions are being homed in a reasonable time to protect the branch from spiralling costs and vet bills.

We await the report, which is sent to our branch (South West Essex RSPCA) who will then advise us accordingly or recommend improvements. Fingers crossed! It is always the aim of the Cat Sanctuary to outguess these official visits to make sure there is nothing to criticise. Looks like we got caught out on the temperature gauge. We see it every day and after a while don’t notice it. Still, no harm done and at least that was easy to fix.