Executives from 24 Dutch councils, including Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Utrecht and The Hague, are urging the economic affairs ministry to ban circuses from using wild animals.

The council officials have written to junior economic affairs minister Sharon Dijksma urging her to bring in a ban as soon as possible, in line with the coalition agreement of 2012.

Councils are not currently able to ban circuses which have wild animals from their jurisdiction and need national legislation to make it possible.

Wild animals in circuses have ‘little room to live in, spend a large part of the day in a cage or chained up… Entertainment involving animals gives the audience, children in particular, a bad example about how to treat animals,’ news agency ANP quotes the letter as saying.

The letter was drawn up by Joost Eerdmans who has animal welfare in his portfolio in Rotterdam. Other signatories come from Almelo, Gouda, Haarlem and Schiedam.