French MPs propose mandatory cameras in abattoirs
AFP on September 21, 2016, 2:53 am
Paris (AFP) - French lawmakers on Tuesday proposed mandatory surveillance cameras for abattoirs to combat cruelty against livestock after an animal rights group published shocking slaughterhouse videos.
The proposal is the "result of a rude shock, to me and to millions of French people who saw the videos of the L214 association," said Olivier Falorni, who headed a six-month parliamentary inquiry into the scandal.
Footage of sheep being bled while still showing signs of consciousness and a lamb being butchered alive shed light on the "omerta", or code of silence, "that prevailed in the abattoirs", Falorni said.
The lawmakers who worked on the cross-party inquiry are proposing that surveillance cameras be required by law in "all areas of abattoirs where live animals are handled", with funding provided for the devices at small plants.
They said the law should be carefully crafted to prevent the cameras from being used by employers to spy on their staff.
The lawmakers are also calling for stepped-up training of staff and the hiring of veterinary experts to oversee slaughtering procedures at all abattoirs of 50 employees or more.
A "national abattoir ethics committee" would be set up under the plan.
The MPs proposed that guidelines be amended to encourage electric stunning before ritual slaughter.
But it would not be made mandatory, as a law to that effect "would be contested" in court, according to the committee's rapporteur, Jean-Yves Caullet.
Muslim halal and Jewish shechita rules require an animal to be conscious when its throat is cut.
France's Grand Rabbi Haim Korsia, in a statement to AFP, "hailed the lawmakers' wish to guarantee the animal's well-being... along with the preservation of ritual slaughter."
He said the MPs had struck a balance between the needs for "secularism and the free exercise of faith."
The L214 animal rights group for its part launched a petition on Tuesday to ban slaughter without prior stunning.
It said it would take an abattoir to court for "infractions" committed during the ritual slaughter of sheep for the just-ended Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha.
The foundation of actress and animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot said the proposal did not go far enough, saying it was "imperative" to require animals to be stunned before their throats are slit.
The L214 campaign prompted the agriculture ministry to order nationwide inspections of abattoirs in March.
Last week another French animal rights group demanded a ban on raising angora rabbits for their prized fur, releasing a secretly recorded video during which the animals squeal while being shorn.
AFP
