The hearings got off to a flying start during the environment committee on Wednesday 18. While the hearings of representatives of religions were about to begin, the deputy Défi Jonathan De Patoul, initiator of the proposal for an ordinance to make the felling systematic with bewilderment, proposes to “discuss as a priority the text tabled by Groen le VlD and Défi”. The commission is indeed studying the text of these three parties, but also one from Vlaams Belang and one from the N-VA relating to this same ban on slaughter without prior stunning. Note that the Vlaams Belang offers a non-reversible stunning.
The texts of the extreme right were deposited before that of Défi, Open VLD and Groen. The rules of parliament then provide that the texts are treated chronologically in relation to their date of submission unless the committee decides otherwise.
And that was not the case: in the vote PS, Ecolo, Spa, PTB voted to maintain the agenda, so that the text of Vlaams Belang remains first. CDH, MR, and Défi voted to put the text “Défi, O-VLD et Groen” up first. The N-VA abstained, Groen did not vote.
“It is an anti-democracy event”
Alexia Bertrand (MR) then decided to step up, outside of the commission: “It never happens. There was a rupture of the sanitary cordon this morning. In this situation on another text, if the MR had done what the PS and Ecolo did, they would have set us on fire,” confides the MP. But beyond the procedural debate, she sees a political strategy. “It’s a way to vote the text of Vlaams Belang first. We’re going to try that it doesn’t happen, but it would be a way to see who votes what. It could also disqualify the text, discredit it by passing it off as an extremist text, which is not the case for the one proposed by Challenge. As a reminder, in the estimates, the MR deputies are almost all in favor of the obligation of slaughter with stunning.
Technically, PS and Ecolo did not vote like Vlaams Belang since the latter does not have the right to vote in the environment committee (because there are too few deputies in plenary). The Open VLD either, but for reasons of agreement at the start of the legislature.
Martin Casier, representative of the PS on the commission, defends himself: “It was a vote “for or against the rules of procedure”. We voted for the settlement. If we start changing that every time, we’re going to have problems. The debate is not about the sanitary cordon. Every time the Vlaams Belang takes the floor, all the French-speaking democratic groups leave the room. The PS did it again this morning. Where we have also applied the cord is for the agenda of the text of Vlaams Belang. We didn’t want them on this file. Their text dates from the beginning of the mandate and we waited for a text from other parties to put it on the agenda.
In the end, the text of the Vlaams Belang remained first on the agenda. The hearings of representatives of Jewish and Muslim worship were then able to begin, followed by those of the Abattoirs d’Anderlecht and the Federation of Halal butchers. The representatives of the Jewish and Muslim communities expressed their feeling of being in the crosshairs for their religious convictions insofar as other forms of killing for food purposes are not targeted by the same concerns in Belgium ( force-feeding of geese, scalding of lobsters, hunting). For some of them, there is also reason to question beforehand the impact of stunning on animal suffering.
At the Anderlecht slaughterhouse, 80% of the animals are slaughtered without stunning, which raises questions for its leaders for the future. According to them, the prohibition of this process will lead to a decline in animal welfare because transport times (note: abroad) will be lengthened.