The Vegan Thread

Interesting news from the Vegan Society:

Animal sentience has been omitted from Withdrawal bill

Tom Kuehnel discusses what this will mean for animals, and what you can do to help.

Following the UK’s decision to withdraw from the European Union in last year’s referendum, it has been decided that all European legislation will be reinstated as UK law. The process through which this will happen is dictated by the European (Withdrawal) bill, although you might know it by the grandiose sounding moniker: ‘Great Repeal Bill’.

The EU has provided us with 80% of our animal welfare legislation, but not everything will automatically be enshrined into domestic law. Arguably the most troubling omission, certainly from the animals’ point of view, is the exclusion of article 13 of the Lisbon Treaty, an article which recognises animal sentience. This essentially means that government doesn’t have to pay any regard to an animal’s welfare, or grant them any rights.

Of course this legislation is often used to improve the conditions of farmed animals, and does little to liberate these animals from farms and their inevitable fate at the slaughterhouse, but at least it gives animal advocates something to work on. Who knows what this law will give way to in the future, but at the very least we should recognise animal sentience, something so fundamental which we can use to build rights and other recognitions on top of in the future.

You can see how this ridiculous Bill is probably quite heavily shaped by lobbying by animal exploitation organisations.