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Lutte contre la maltraitance animale : la commission des affaires économiques fait le choix du renforcement des liens entre humains et animaux

By September 22nd, 2021October 6th, 2021No Comments

Document type : Press release from the French Senate

Author: Philippe Péjo

Preview: The Economic Affairs Committee , on Wednesday 22 September, adopted the bill to strengthen the fight against animal abuse. It has been careful to preserve a continued place for animals in our lives and to rectify some secondary consequences of the bill so that it will be easier for associations and charities to operate on the ground.

Immediately following the adoption of the bill by the National Assembly, the rapporteur Anne Chain-Larché (Les Républicains - Seine-et-Marne) carried out an intense consultation process with stakeholders in the field and specialists in the animal world. She conducted more than fifty hearings and made numerous field trips to confer with professionals, animal protection associations, local elected officials and government departments.

The commission has made it a priority to fight the causes and consequences of abandonment, for which France is sadly top of the league in Europe with 100,000 abandonments each year. In order to fight against the 'impulse' purchase of pets, the French Commission for Economic Affairs has built on the work achieved by the National Assembly in voting for a certificate of knowledge and commitment that would increase responsibility in pet buyers by introducing a cooling-off period of 7 days before purchase.

It also made it possible to continue to sell animals in pet shops, which are in fact already part of a process controlled by the French departmental directorates for population protection (DDPP), through which animals are identified and tracked, in order to prevent purchases being resold on the Internet or through illegal undeclared routes. It equally made provision for regular revisions to the regulations in force for such pet shops, banned the display of animals in shop windows and introduced the creation of a partnership between shelters, associations without shelters and pet shops. Last, it increased the penalties for the illegal trafficking of animals and the theft of animals used to fuel such activities.

Recognising the immense work carried out in the regions by associations and charities, alongside local elected representatives, the committee facilitated and provided for the regulation of the use of foster families for abandoned animals and formally recognised associations operating without shelters. It has also introduced a VAT exemption for veterinary interventions in shelters, a measure that will have a direct impact on animal welfare.

The committee refused to convert the discretionary powers currently held by local mayors concerning the capture, identification and sterilisation of stray cats into a statutory duty unless additional resources were provided by the State. The rapporteur has called for a national campaign in which mayors and veterinarians will actively pass on the message by displaying information on their premises concerning identification requirements and the benefits of sterilisation.

The committee wished to strengthen the criminal penalties for perpetrators of animal abuse, and has therefore prohibited zoophilia in France and has made acts of cruelty to an animal when committed in front of a minor into an aggravating circumstance. It also added a preventive dimension to this component of the criminal law by encouraging the education of children on animal ethics and providing for the early care of children when their household has been reported for animal abuse.

With regard to wild animals, the Committee on Economic Affairs has allowed dolphinariums to continue their activities by setting up a specialised council offering genuine scientific expertise to inform the decisions of public authorities seeking operational solutions for cetaceans. In the event of non-compliance, targeted bans could be imposed. Wishing to provide circuses with the means to evolve, it has established a list of authorised animals and has set up a dialogue with a board assigned to look into the challenges of itinerancy.

In the view of the Bill's rapporteur, Anne Chain-Larché (Les Républicains - Seine-et-Marne), "the logic of prohibition has never worked: rather than closing down legal sales channels or banning the keeping of wild animals in circuses and dolphinariums, we have preferred to establish more demanding regulations and controls. These safeguards and bans would have risked distorting the relationship between animals and humans. This is why we renamed this text: a bill to strengthen the bond between humans and animals." So let us improve our practices and strengthen the quality of the bond between animals and humans rather than erecting barriers that will ultimately be ingnored."

According to the President of the Commission, Sophie Primas (Les Républicains - Yvelines), "the evolution of sensitivity to animal welfare has created the need for legislative changes. Shoulder to shoulder with  the National Assembly and in the spirit of the authors of the bill, the many advances voted by the committee show that the Senate knows how to be receptive to societal demands, to be a force for constructive proposals and to commit itself to animal protection."

Link to the full report from the Committee on Economic Affairs

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