How can people not care for their animals?

Does she come in your house at all? I would just take it, leave the doors open like something has taken it and house it inside.
Keep it inside, where she won't know you have it?
Alternatively I would just tell her it's cruel and you are coming through collect it to take care of it, rather than asking.

This!!! Just do it

I’d be fretting about it too OP. Guinea pigs are so sweet but not as easy to care for as people think. This poor soul is suffering - I’d go with the fox plan…. And distance myself from her - she is not a good person to treat an animal so.

Please please take it OP and make it look like it escaped. Then take it to a rescue centre. That is heartbreaking to read and you MUST intervene immediately. How utterly cruel she is.

Please can you update us , I can’t stand animal cruelty. Please rescue it ❤️

Ok - the most important thing is the guinea pig’s welfare.

I would report to RSPCA and tell a local rescue organisation as well.

In the meantime, offer to pay her for the cage - you will take it off her hands etc.

If the RSPCA does nothing and she doesn’t want to sell to you, find a way to make it look like it escaped or was got by a fox, and get it to a rescue centre. In those circumstances you probably can’t keep it but it will find a good home.

I would try to keep things civil but I would struggle to be friendly with someone who could do that to an animal. They sound really ignorant and horrible to purposely leave it to starve to death.

What sort of test do you think they should take to get a guinea pig license?!

What do you think that would do?
People need to get a licence before they drive. Or buy a gun.
It's people that are the problem and laws and licences can only do so much.
I think we need to realise that keeping pets is not in their best interests and they should be relegated to the past when we didn't know better.

I think that people should be required to get a license before being allowed to get a pet.

And if you do rescue it, I would video yourself doing it, and demonstrating the living conditions it is being kept in, just incase she tries to report you for theft or trespassing.

Be the better person OP and take the poor thing and dgaf what she says or thinks of you. Hold your head up high whenever you see her, she's vile. But I would also then take him or her to a reputable rescue who specialises in small animals and will be in a position to care for the poor little thing properly and rehome it to a home with some company

Please take it, it must be suffering terribly. As for her being a carer , what carer doesn’t look after her own pets !! Sorry I report her to her care home as well !!

Agree. Find someone who'll love it preferably a distance away so she cant track it down. Shes lost her rights to be its owner by neglecting the poor thing. Find a new loving home. If you keep it she'll want it back. Horrible woman.

I think you have to keep on offering to take it. Is she going away during her annual leave? You could offer to take it whilst she’s away and then say you’d like to keep it maybe? I do agree this is cruelty, and in an ideal world reporting it to the RSPCA would be the solution, but it wouldn’t guarantee any action was taken, and it would cause huge conflict between you and your neighbour.

This. 100%.

They did NOTHING and the dog remained chained by the neck on concrete 24/7. It was horrific. They did nothing at all to help because it 'had water and food once a day'

That might be why but it doesn’t change when people say oh call the rspca they mostly they won’t be coming. It rather proves they won’t be.

It took a lot of arguing with them to get them to come to chickens flooded out with zero dry space and no food as it was well flooded.

We couldn’t do anything as we had no rights to break into the locked chicken runs, the rspca can with police back up. Police wouldn’t be coming out because an allotment manager rings them about some chickens. We needed them and they tried so hard to not come.

Or how about just not bother with them at all
and have animal safety funded by the government and an agency who have real
power?

Here's an idea: how about the chief exec and all the other execs take a pay cut? They'd be able to employ a fair few more inspectors then.

@Sweetdreamsbeautifulnightmare don’t offer to buy it. That’s what I did and she said no.

It’s best to take it secretly and rehome. If it goes wrong and she finds out tell her you’ll happily hand it over to rspca. Take photos of the bare cage with no hay etc. if filthy or no water, even better.

Get your evidence ready. You are rescuing it. Good luck.

It’s because they prioritise those animals most at risk. They only have around 300 inspectors to cover all of the UK and receive approx 2500 calls per day.

I hope you can hatch a plan to rescue the piggie OP. Poor little thing, why are people so ridiculously cruel and thoughtless? Makes my blood boil!

It doesn’t matter though because in this case the law won’t be enforced, therefore no impact of breaking it. The law will be ignorant of this, not asked to recognise nuance

People do all sorts of things that break the law for all sorts of reasons, some of which are altruistic. But unfortunately the law doesn't recognise nuance.

I agree with other posters about offering the woman some money. It should show her you’re serious about wanting to look after it.