Canadian parliamentarians are eating seal meat for lunch today to show support for hunters who have lost a key market here in Europe. Last year, the EU banned seal products calling Canada’s annual cull barbaric and cruel. But will Canadian solidarity for the seal hunt change European minds?
The Canadian parliament’s restaurant has an unusual menu for today’s lunch. On offer, a three course meal, all of which includes seal meat. The main course is a double smoked bacon-wrapped seal loin served with beets, carrots, and turnips in a port sauce.
In July 2009, the 27 EU member states adopted a ban on seal products. MEPs argued that the seal hunt is cruel and also provides few economic benefits. The ban means no seal products may be imported into the EU unless the animals were killed as part of a traditional hunt carried out by indigenous groups. Canadian Senator Céline Hervieux-Payette disagrees with the EU ban and decided to stage today’s lunch in protest at what she sees as Europe meddling in Canada’s affairs.
Banning the trade
Around 6000 Canadians take part in seal hunting each year along the Atlantic coast, producing an estimated 7 million euros in exports last year alone. The Canadian government allows up 338,000 seals to be killed annually and says the hunt does not threaten the country’s seal population which is estimated at more than 6 million. But European parliamentarian Arlene McCarthy thinks Canadians have missed the point of the ban:
“The European Union has made a decision that we are banning what we see as a cruel commercial trade in seal products. We are not banning any practices... We are banning the trade in seal products. We are entitled to determine what comes into our markets, what appears on our shelves. That is something we do have legal competence for in the EU…Canadians are free to do whatever they wish to do… We’ve produced legislation to respond to our citizens’ concerns.”
A matter of principle
Senator Hervieux-Payette says Europe has been influenced by lobbyists and points out that the seal trade supports thousands of Canadian families. Ms Hervieux-Payette hails from Quebec where much of the seal hunt takes place and has vowed that Canada will take up the matter with the World Trade Organisation. For her, the EU ban smacks of hypocrisy:
“It’s a matter of principle… You have people conducting hunting activities just for sport in Europe…”
She points out that Canadian politicians do not concern themselves with whether European game is killed humanely or not.
But animal rights groups argue that the Canadian hunters often target baby seals and kill the animals in an inhumane way. MEP Arlene McCarthy agrees and says Canada’s government is merely resisting progress:
“The change that Canadians have to face up to is that our consumers do not want to buy seal products coming from this cruel trade… We are not going to have these products coming on the market. Instead of organising stunts, the Canadians should just get on with it. Accept the fact that the EU has passed this law and start to make sure they support people through the process of change.”
Listen to an interview with Canadian MP and seal hunting support Senator Céline Hervieux-Payette and also an interview with MEP and seal hunting opponent Arlene McCarthy.
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To be apart of the WTO you have to agree to abide by the rules of trade between nations. And I emphasize TRADE. When a country makes a law based on emotion and not facts that effectively shuts an industry down in another country, then they are breaking the rules of the WTO. There are independant veterinarian organization and wild life management organizations that have stated this hunt should be a model for other seal hunts around the world. That will be hard to defend against at the WTO hearings. Bridet Curran's reasoning for the EU's defense doesn't stand a chance.
Here the world is crying foul as we dine on seal meat (gross), while our government is running circles around human rights issues and may very well be in violation of the Geneva Convention by being complicit in torture in Afghanistan, and the world hasn't made a peep.
Well said!! xo
I'm a Canadian living abroad who often defends the seal hunt. The hypocrisy of those who oppose the hunt but eat/wear meat always astonishes me. If PETA or other propaganda machines where allowed to record how pigs are raised and slaughtered (especially in The Netherlands), you would see a far more cruel practice. Factory farming which provides most meat products in Europe (and veal for Kroketten) is a much greater atrocity to animals than the seal hunt.
PETA has been successful in demonizing the seal hunt leaving Canada with few choices. I for one, and proud that we have chosen to defend ourselves against this ignorance and hypocrisy.
Canada, like much of the world for the last twenty five years,has had poor quality national government as a result of the WTO/IMF monetarist programs. The last four years under the Straussian Neo Con agenda of PM Harper have been ones of political thuggery, evasion of responsibility and lack of respect for Canadian rights and freedoms as well as contempt for human rights in general. That said, the seal hunt is not a simple issue, involving as it does a voracious predator of northern cod. Yes, overfishing by all nations operating fleets on the Grand Banks has devastated the stocks, but fishermen in these waters will tell you of steaming for days through vast herds of seals whose unrestricted growth compounds the error in resource management.
I am Canadian, and I am embarrassed by the conduct of our parliament. Unfortunately Canadian reality these days is that a small minority of extreme right wing idiots are well under way destroying Canada`s image, and our inept opposition doesn`t have the courage to actually do whats right.
Hope for a day when Canada will once have good government and stop making terrible choices.
I support your thoughts and thank you for sharing them.
Please do not miscontrue Canadian parliamentarians dining on seal flesh for a photo-op as Canadian solidarity for the commercial seal hunt. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Polling consistently shows the majority of Canadians are opposed to the annual atrocity. I run Atlantic Canadian Anti-Sealing Coalition which gives a much-needed voice to the many people in Atlantic Canada (some living in fishing and sealing communities) who oppose the commercial seal hunt and want it abolished and a license buyback implemented. I have documented the annual slaughter for the past three years and we are actively involved in shutting the industry down.
Most Canadians are extremely happy about the EU seal product ban. It is only a small population that supports commercial seal hunting. Unfortunately, they are the ones who make the seal hunt a voting issue, which is why Canadian parliamentarians are now gagging down unpalatable seal flesh for the cameras and putting on various other outrageous PR stunts - not to show support for sealers, but to buy their votes.
Thank you to the EU for the seal ban - stand firm in the face of Canadian WTO bully tactics.
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