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About Pip

Award-winning broadcaster. VSA-certified professional dog trainer. Rescue dog advocate. Host of The Petcast. The UK’s Dog Trainer to the Stars.

The most important thing I’ve ever learned about behaviour, human or canine, I learned from a dog.

If you’re reading this, something with your dog is probably harder than you thought it would be.

I see it every week in my sessions. The walks which aren’t relaxing, the recall which is ‘ignored’ the second something more interesting appears, the rescue you can’t quite work out, the puppy you love but can’t always live with. The list goes on.

I’ve also lived through a version of it myself with my own two dogs. So when I tell you that most of what feels permanent isn’t, I’m not guessing.

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My First 25 Years

You may know me from ITV’s Good Morning Britain, ITV’s regional news, Sky News, GB News or Global’s LBC News. I spent 25 years as a national broadcast journalist. I anchored news, presented live to millions and interviewed the likes of Simon Cowell, Dwayne Johnson, George Clooney and Hugh Jackman along the way. The Royal Television Society named me Presenter of the Year twice, in 2010 and again in 2012. My first chief reporter job, at the Express and Star newspaper, came at the age of 23.

I loved it. In many ways I still do.

A few years ago, something started to shift. What you’re chasing in your twenties isn’t always what you’re chasing in your forties. I had to be honest with myself about what I actually wanted the next chapter to look like. The answer kept coming back to dogs.

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About Us

My First 25 Years

You may know me from ITV’s Good Morning Britain, ITV’s regional news, Sky News, GB News or Global’s LBC News. I spent 25 years as a national broadcast journalist. I anchored news, presented live to millions and interviewed the likes of Simon Cowell, Dwayne Johnson, George Clooney and Hugh Jackman along the way. The Royal Television Society named me Presenter of the Year twice, in 2010 and again in 2012. My first chief reporter job, at the Express and Star newspaper, came at the age of 23.

I loved it. In many ways I still do.

A few years ago, something started to shift. What you’re chasing in your twenties isn’t always what you’re chasing in your forties. I had to be honest with myself about what I actually wanted the next chapter to look like. The answer kept coming back to dogs.

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What Happened

in South Korea

I went to South Korea twice with Humane World for Animals, then known as Humane Society International, to investigate the dog meat trade after adopting Bindi a few months earlier. She had arrived in the UK terrified of everyone and everything. 

The first trip was for ITV’s Good Morning Britain. Simon Cowell, who’s one of the UK’s most well-known dog lovers, was extraordinary in helping us tell the story to a national audience.

I came home different.

On meat farms, I came face to face with broken dogs who were terrified of humans, cowering at the back of wire cages with no idea how to socialise. Others pinned themselves to the bars, desperate for human contact and touch and attention. I found dead puppies on the floor, tossed aside like litter. The stench, and the sound of dozens of dogs in barren cages 24 hours a day, never leaves you.

That experience was sombre and painful and it energises me every single day.

I returned a second time as a volunteer, to help shut down a farm. There I met and adopted Robin.

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Robin and Bindi

Robin is a Cocker Spaniel mix. Bindi is a Chihuahua-Spitz mix who’s shy of most people but has decided I’m her person. With me, she’s adorable.

Both spent the early months of their lives in a wire cage, twenty-four hours a day with no socialisation. They came home with the kinds of needs you can only really see once a dog is in your house and the trauma starts to surface.

Rehabilitating them changed the direction of my life. So when I’m working with someone whose rescue is struggling, or whose dog has had a bad experience and now reacts to the world in a way that feels overwhelming, I have been there. I know what it’s like to live with a terrified dog who comes with all manner of needs to manage, rather than a bouncy 8-week-old puppy. And I know what’s possible at the other end of it.

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About Us

Robin and Bindi

Robin is a Cocker Spaniel mix. Bindi is a Chihuahua-Spitz mix who’s shy of most people but has decided I’m her person. With me, she’s adorable.

Both spent the early months of their lives in a wire cage, twenty-four hours a day with no socialisation. They came home with the kinds of needs you can only really see once a dog is in your house and the trauma starts to surface.

Rehabilitating them changed the direction of my life. So when I’m working with someone whose rescue is struggling, or whose dog has had a bad experience and now reacts to the world in a way that feels overwhelming, I have been there. I know what it’s like to live with a terrified dog who comes with all manner of needs to manage, rather than a bouncy 8-week-old puppy. And I know what’s possible at the other end of it.

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Qualified, Certified, and Still Learning

I’m a VSA-certified professional dog trainer through the Victoria Stilwell Academy, one of the most respected positive-reinforcement training programmes in the world. I have completed an advanced reactivity course with the same academy because rescue dogs – and dogs who struggle with the world around them – is the work I’m most passionate about.

I’ll always keep learning. Your dog deserves a trainer who never stops.

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How I Work

No two dogs are the same and no two homes are the same. So no two plans I write are the same.

I work with positive, science-based methods. We reward the behaviours we want and we build a dog who’s engaged, motivated and genuinely happy to learn, without fear or force. I’m calm, I’m patient and I’m honest. If something needs to change in the way you’re working with your dog, I’ll tell you. Kindly, but I’ll tell you.

The rest of it is about communication. Twenty-five years of live TV trains you to explain complicated things in plain language under pressure. That’s what I do for you in our sessions. No jargon. No confusing terminology. Just clear, practical guidance you can use tonight, tomorrow morning, on your next walk.

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About Us

How I Work

No two dogs are the same and no two homes are the same. So no two plans I write are the same.

I work with positive, science-based methods. We reward the behaviours we want and we build a dog who’s engaged, motivated and genuinely happy to learn, without fear or force. I’m calm, I’m patient and I’m honest. If something needs to change in the way you’re working with your dog, I’ll tell you. Kindly, but I’ll tell you.

The rest of it is about communication. Twenty-five years of live TV trains you to explain complicated things in plain language under pressure. That’s what I do for you in our sessions. No jargon, no confusing terminology. Just clear, practical guidance you can use tonight, tomorrow morning, on your next walk.

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Who I Work With Best

I work with a deliberately small number of private clients. The people who get the most out of working with me tend to:

  • See their dog as part of the family
  • Want to actually enjoy life with their dog, not just manage them
  • Be open to learning, including changing the way they speak about and to their dog
  • Be willing to do the work between sessions, not just within them
  • Be honest, communicative and reliable. They do their homework and they tell me when something isn’t landing

If that sounds like you then we’re going to get along very well.

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Certificates

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If You’re Ready to Talk

The first step is a free Zoom Discovery Call. We spend twenty minutes talking properly. About your dog, what’s going on, what you want life to look like, and whether the Behaviour Transformation Package is the right fit for both of you. No pressure. No obligation.
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