Animal protection policies
What does the Constitutional Court say about animal protection policies?
On July 15, the Constitutional Court ( TS) handed down its sentence on an appeal claiming that La Rioja’s regional law for protection of animals ( Law 6/ 2018 of November 26) may be unconstitutional.
The TC was clear and ruled in favour of the new law, apart from a few details which I will address later, and it also spoke out about public animal protection policies and the animalist ideology.
The appeal ( n º 1203/ 2019) was made against several principals of La Rioja’s regional law for protection of animals and the sentence is 47 pages long!
On page 14 of the ruling it states:
“The growing concern in current society for the protection and wellbeing of animals has crossed over into public policies, giving rise to the appearance of differing state and regional legislation, such as Law 6/ 2018 in La Rioja.
“… ( this law) has respected the division of powers over different matters which public policies relative to animal protection and wellbeing uphold.
The TC also spoke about animalist ideology.
Law 6/ 2018 in La Rioja was appealed against by more than 50 senators from the Partido Popular ( PP) parliamentary group from that region.
These senators gave various motives for their appeal, some of which are as follows:
1. It violates freedom of ideology and freedom of religion ( protected under article 16.1 of the Spanish Constitution).
2. It violates the system of values regulated in article 10 of the Spanish constitution, by imposing an animalist ideology that establishes a dangerous equalisation between the dignity of people, a supreme constitutional value, and protection of animals.
3. The animalist ideology, which equates the wellbeing of animals with that of human beings, is a philosophical conviction that can be legitimately defended, but cannot be imposed on all citizens by law as an obligatory belief.
4. Human dignity and animal welfare cannot be equivalent.
However, the TC said that these objections were not a motive to rule that said law was unconstitutional, and quoting it directly said the following:
“The control exercised by the Court in an appeal alleging unconstitutionality is a legal control and as such not a political control nor one of opportunity.
“Achieving, by means of legislative provisions, that pet animals are afforded good treatment and preventing or minimising, as much as possible, unnecessary, unjustified or preventable suffering of productive animals in livestock and commercial activities, are legitimate means that the state and regional legislator can employ within the framework of their respective powers… and there is no reason that this compromises the inherent dignity of people in any way.
“… the growing concern for the protection of nature and in particular of animals, constitutes a generalised trend in the more advanced societies, which is seen as a sign of moral progress and as such is perfectly adapted and suited to the dignity of human beings.
“The European Convention for the Protection of Pet Animals from 1987 ( ratified by Spain and in force for the Spanish since February 1, 2018)… indicates that ‘ man has the moral obligation to respect all living creatures’.”
There can be no doubt that this sentence is very in keeping with the beliefs of members of the public who look out for the protection of pet animals.
For more information about animal law in Spain and Raquel’s online courses in the subject, see her website www. deanimals. com