VGT campaign Vienna: Heat-free for Fiaker horses from 30°C absolutely necessary

2023-07-11 10:29:45

In the 21st century, 20 sleeping people woke up at Vienna’s Stephansplatz to realize: horses have no place in the center of a city of over a million inhabitants!

Vienna (OTS) – Horses suffer when it’s very hot, especially if they have to be constantly stretched to a carriage on asphalt. And horses suffer from the stress of busy traffic, they are prey animals evolutionarily adapted to the open steppes. This view is essentially only disputed by those who want to abuse horses to earn money in high heat, and of course their supporters among the official veterinarians, who, in the experience of the VGT, oppose any criticism of animal welfare and the worst animal abuse with great regularity holds the pole. If Austria were a direct democracy, horse-drawn carriages would have been banned in big cities long ago. A representative Gallup Poll showed that 72% of people in Austria support heat-free for Fiaker horses from 30°C and a majority of 80% do not want to see Fiaker carriages in any inner city, 42% even only in the countryside.

To point out once again that once again when it comes to animal welfare, those responsible for politics don’t give a damn about the animal-friendly majority opinion and prefer to pursue clientele politics, 20 animal rights activists lay down on the ground at Stephansplatz within sight of the Fiaker stand there and slept. Then they woke up in the 21st century to realize that carriage horses still suffer here in the great heat in the center of a big city.

VGT Chairman DDr. Martin Balluch on this: “Instead of taking animal suffering seriously and acting in a more animal-friendly manner in line with the majority opinion, the city and the federal government mutually blame each other for the suffering of horses in carriages. And the carriage companies themselves prefer to complain, to silence the criticism of the VGT, than to pay attention to their horses accordingly. Unfortunately, some judges also allow themselves to be pulled in front of these SLAPP carts and in all seriousness only hear official veterinarians as experts at the hearing, when really everyone knows that these people are generally anything but neutral. For example, I was reported by an official veterinarian for animal cruelty because I had helped house two animals that had been freed from a fully slatted floor pig factory in a farm with many hectares of pasture. Official veterinarians are not neutral. Allowing only them as witnesses breaks the constitutional principle of fair trial. We will therefore not remain silent and will continue to voice our criticism loudly!”

press photos ( : VGT.at)