I?READ Elizabeth Lloyd's letter (September 13) on the owners of dogs leaving their best friend to have distress, traumatised and die slowly in a car.

Perhaps other readers would like to know of an incident we had when visiting Constantine Bay, Cornwall, in August. On arrival in the car park at 10.30am a lady came up to ask if we would watch a car as it had a dog inside (she wanted to take her own dog for a walk) but was worried as the dog did not seem okay. The car was covered in blankets sealed in by closed windows. My partner went to a shop and asked if they would phone the RSPCA, then a lifeguard offered to phone the police and make an announcement over the tannoy.

After an hour there was no response from the owners. The shop had kindly rang the RSPCA again and the police, but three and a half hours later no one appeared. At this time the car park attendant smashed one of the windows to the car — ten minutes after which the owners turned up and stated that they had only been gone ten minutes on the beach!

Will people ever learn? And yes we do have dogs ourselves, one Jack Russell and one Heinz rescue dog from Spain.

Jean Harris

Okehampton