Document type : Article published in Le Monde (Subscriber edition)
Author: Denis Cosnard
Preview: With six months to go before the presidential election, the French animal welfare association is working to achieve further gains for the animal cause.
This idea has been dreamed up by Robert Badinter. "There needs to be an Animal Rights Defender," suggested this former Minister of Justice (1981-1986) at the end of a conference organised by the French Animal Rights Foundation in 2019. "Writing laws, issuing decisions, holding symposiums, formulating codes, are all good things", he argued. "But only an independent authority can extend the protection, provide the safeguards for animals that are needed" for their "fundamental rights" to be "respected in the real world".
Two years later, Jacques-Charles Fombonne, the President of the Société protectrice des animaux (SPA), took up the proposal. "Yes, we must establish the position of animal rights defender, just as there is one for human rights," he told Le Monde. A former senior officer of the French gendarmerie, he now heads up France's main animal-protection association. He suggests that this independent official, appointed for a single term by the President of the Republic like the Human Rights Defender, Claire Hédon, would be given administrative powers and would alert the public authorities. "He or she could say, for example: 'Mr President, the import and sale of dogs from Romania is disgraceful. Here is how to stop it happening'," suggests Jacques-Charles Fombonne.
Before he took up the cause, a group of elected representatives worked on what such a post could look like. Loïc Dombreval, a member of La République en Marche who represents the Alpes-Maritimes region, set out the details in a report submitted to the government in 2020, as well as in a bill he tabled in July along with other parliamentarians from the majority group.
Now, with six months to go before the presidential election, the head of the French SPA wants to take advantage of the electoral campaign to help the animal cause. Some 2% to 3% of voters will probably make their decision based on this issue," he says. So it matters. In the 2019 European elections, the Animalist Party list won 2.1% of the vote, almost as much as the UDI and the Communists.
"Unhoped-for" agreement
In addition to lending support for the creation of an Animal Rights Defender, the SPA would like the presidential candidates to take up its other proposals, such as banning the sale of animals in pet shops and on the Internet, putting an end to bullfighting and stopping ritual slaughter as it is practised today. For now, the association is experiencing some difficulty in making itself heard. In its campaign against bullfighting, it has taken five of the main bullfighting cities to court, but to no avail. (rest of article, subscription only)
