Animals are sentient beings. I say it again. Animals. Are. Sentient. Beings.
What’s more, this isn’t just my opinion, it’s the law of the land too. It has been since before we entered the European Union and it was further reinforced in the Animal Rights Act of 2006. The EU Withdrawal Bill also ensures that all existing EU protections are transferred to the UK law as well.
Moreover, in the last few months without any input from the EU, the UK has decided to ban the trade of ivory, we’ve decided to put cameras in slaughterhouses to ensure the highest standards of animal welfare and we’ve strengthened the prison sentences for animal cruelty. In banning plastic microbeads, introducing the charge for plastic bags and now pushing on with a deposit return scheme for plastic bottles; we’re starting to make progress on reducing the plastic in our seas that is so dangerous to our marine life too.
So if UK law already recognises animals as sentient beings. If the UK is already pushing ahead with animal welfare measures that leave the EU in the shade. And if the EU – which is held up as a panacea for animal rights by so many on social media – still allows veal farming, foie gras production, bullfighting, live animal exports for slaughter and cruel fur imports; why on earth is there such a furore over an unnecessary amendment to the Withdrawal Bill that was debated last week?
The answer is one of two things. Either people have misunderstood that the House of Commons is not only a debating chamber but also a legislature where we must make good laws not just signal our virtue. Or the purveyors of fake or politically motivated news have quite deliberately decided to portray voting against an unnecessary amendment as positive support for the inverse. Whichever is the case, and for the avoidance of any remaining doubt, let me be clear one last time: Animals are sentient beings.