Ottawa’s ill-fated attempt to toughen cruelty-to-animals legislation for the first time in more than a century has suffered another setback.
The Senate approved the bill in principle April 20 but then sent it to a committee where, in the past, it has been stalled and amended by senators who believe the new legal rules could undermine the ability of farmers to farm, natives to hunt and trap and researchers to use animals in their research.
The committee has not scheduled hearings on the bill and even if the bill makes it to the agenda in later weeks, the committee likely would spend several weeks debating the issue.
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A widely expected spring election call would kill the bill for the fourth time.
In the Parliament now nearing an end, the House of Commons has approved a version of the bill three times but it has been amended or stalled by the Senate each time. It also appeared in several unapproved versions in the last Parliament that was dissolved with the 2000 election.
Humane societies have pleaded with the Senate to approve the bill this time or risk seeing it lost.
Most agricultural lobby groups say they are willing to see the bill pass because most of the original objections they had about potential attacks on traditional farming methods have been answered.
Winnipeg Conservative senator Terry Stratton, the last speaker in the Senate debate, ended his remarks with the comment: “We will see what happens in committee again.”
Unless an election is delayed into the autumn, there is little expectation that the committee will move quickly to approve the legislation and see it passed into law.
