CELEBRATING 280 DOG YEARS OF EXCELLENCE
30 October 2009
The Minister for Home Affairs, Mr Brendan O’Connor, today visited Customs and Border Protection in Sydney to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Detector Dog Program.
The Minister said that for the last 40 years the Detector Dog Program has played an important role in protecting Australia from prohibited imports such as drugs, firearms and explosives.
“This is a world class program and the committed and highly skilled dogs and handlers play a critical role in protecting Australia’s border.
“Detector dogs are trained to find prohibited imports such as narcotics, firearms and explosives hidden in luggage, mail, cargo, vessels, vehicles, aircraft and on people.
“Last year the Customs and Border Protection detector dog teams attended more than 17,000 tasks and directly contributed to the detection of 380 illicit imports and exports,” Mr O’Connor said.
The detector dogs are bred in the Customs and Border Protection National Breeding and Development Centre in Melbourne and trained at the Detector Dog Training Centre, currently based in Brisbane.
The Program is versatile and effective. The high quality training is evident through detections of unusual drug concealments, including cocaine being carried internally by passengers and heroin concealed in shampoo bottles.
Throughout its history the program has provided dogs and training to other Australian law enforcement agencies and to international customs organisations including the U.S, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Guam, Saipan, Samoa, Papua New Guinea, Japan, New Zealand, and Thailand.
“I congratulate the Detector Dog Program on this significant milestone and look forward to the next 280 dog years”, Mr O’Connor said.
Media Contact: Brian Humphreys 0438 595 567
