Purrs In Our Hearts - Cat Forum UK
Cat General => General Cat Chat => Topic started by: Rosella moggy on November 21, 2017, 09:30:04 AM
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I just signed the petition and wanted to ask if you could add your name too.
http://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/repeal-the-decision-to-exclude-animal-sentience-from-the-eu-withdrawal-bill
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Signed. Am quite horrified by that. Talk about taking a retrograde step. :doh:
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Signed.
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Goodness me, I had no idea about that. A retrograde step indeed. Thanks for posting Rosella.
Signed
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I am livid about this, when I told oh he kept on about it all night, wish I'd kept quiet! anyway he signed a different petition I think on change but it looks like with the numbers signing it will have to be discussed
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so here is what my mp had to say - basically I'm wrong
Thank you for contacting me about animal rights.
I have been appalled by the misleading newspaper headlines such as "MPs vote 'that animals cannot feel pain or emotions' in Brexit bill" which have caused such an incorrect impression about our legislative processes. Nothing is being changed in UK law, and Parliament is not denying that animals are sentient. I hope the following will clarify this for you.
The UK, before entering the EU, already recognised animal sentience in UK law, and was in fact the country responsible for bringing this recognition into EU law. Even the proposer of the amendment, in her opening speech on the amendment, said:
"By way of background, in 1997-20 years ago-the UK Government, during their presidency of the EU, convinced the then 14 other member states that EU law should explicitly recognise that animals were sentient beings, and not simply agricultural goods like bags of potatoes that could be maltreated with impunity. In other words, it was a recognition that, like us, animals are aware of their surroundings; that they have the capacity to feel pain, hunger, heat and cold; and that they are aware of what is happening to them and of their interaction with other animals, including humans."
I understand the main reason was to harmonise the legal status of animals under the French Civil Code with its Penal and Rural Codes, which already recognised animals as having interests that could not apply to inanimate property. It made no change to the protections animals enjoy. UK laws are arranged differently, so it is not possible to draw a direct comparison between our legal regimes, but I did note that French legislators explicitly rejected bans on bullfighting and cockfighting, both of which are illegal here.
Dominic Raab's reply explains why the amendment was unnecessary:
"The reference to animals as sentient beings is, effectively, a statement of fact in article 13, but even though it is, in effect, declaratory, I can reassure the hon. Member that it is already recognised as a matter of domestic law, primarily in the Animal Welfare Act 2006. If an animal is capable of experiencing pain and suffering, it is sentient and therefore afforded protection under that Act."
The UK's animal rights laws, such as the Animal Welfare Act 2006 and the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, already afford animals protection in the UK, regardless of the inclusion or exclusion of the term 'sentient'. In fact, based on the Animal Welfare Act, the Animal Protection Index, maintained by World Animal Protection, rates the UK's formal recognition of animal sentience as grade A. Other Lisbon Treaty signatories such as France, Italy and Spain do not enjoy this rating, having each received grade C.
I certainly would not want to import lesser standards of care from the EU for animals into the UK.
I hope the above clarifies this for you. All the quotations are taken from the transcript on Hansard, which can be found here:
http://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2017-11-15/debates/7A700C0E-8BA2-4EEC-B53D-997028C06900/EuropeanUnion(Withdrawal)Bill
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I had a brief look at Animal Protection Index and we do seem to come out well but it's difficult to tell if that is partly due to EU legislation or not. I certainly don't think that the fuss is all about the lack of the word sentient in UK domestic law. As I understand it we are pretty good at protecting pets but less so with wildlife, farmed animals and animals used for experiments.
Just wondering who your MP is Dawn? My MP is Preet Singh. She voted to keep the EU legislation as part of UK law as did Jeremy Corbyn; both vegetarians.
Before posting this thread I did try trawling through the Hansard report on the debate but from what I could fathom it was talked out or whatever they call it when MPs won't yield to allow other opinions to be debated even from their own side. The debate as such was therefore extremely one sided.
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My worry and suspicion is that the ground is being laid to make it easier to import and export food with the USA whose standards of animal husbandry are not as high as Europe.
We should be aiming to be far less reliant on meat products esp beef.
https://www.skepticalscience.com/how-much-meat-contribute-to-gw.html
I'm not vegetarian but, growing up, I remember a great deal of beans or spaghetti on toast meals and I'm still here.
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Cheryl gillan not my taste I admit I did reply saying that many mps voted in a different way to her so clearly didn't think it unnecessary
I always treat petitions wit suspicion to be honest but could not let this pass in the hansard except the green party women claims the2006 bill only covers companion aanimals so I will investigate further
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Some very pertinent comments, ladies. Like you Rosella, growing up, meat was pretty expensive, and we ate a fair few veggie meals because they were cheap, and we were fortunate enough to have a share in an allotment. The average meat portion was 4 oz (100 gm?) per adult.
I think you've hit the nail on the head there, with regard to potential for importing US meat products. Very grim, what goes on behind the scenes in parliament, and what they sell up to us. Remember John Gummer feeding his daughter a burger to try and "disprove" BSE?
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we did get meat although not that you would recognise! there is a group for anti hunt conservative mps which I was pleased to discover a while ago, I had tarred them all with the same brush anyway this is what they have to say
http://www.conservativesagainstfoxhunting.com/2017/11/3989/
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Thanks for looking into this further Dawn, the explanation in the link is very clear.
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I heard about this on the news. Standards of animal husbandry in the UK may be poor, but they are better than in most of continental Europe. Lowering standards will allow greater imports and exports, already at a worrying level, and therefore greater profits for those with a vested interest, ie. factory farms, big supermarkets and politicians. It is also the thin end of the wedge for reintroducing full blood sports, enjoyed by politicians and their supporters. Higher standards would be maintained without this sort of legislation and if the UK consummed British produce.