Green Party Chair Urszula Zielińska recalled that it was the Greens who ensured that animal rights were included in the coalition agreement. – I am very pleased that the provisions we proposed concerning better animal protection in Poland received the approval of all parties in the 15 October Coalition – she said Urszula Zielińska. She also added that the Greens would do everything to turn these general provisions into specific laws in the near future.
– One such bill, already submitted during the previous parliamentary term, is a bill banning the use of pyrotechnic materials such as fireworks. Unfortunately, like many good proposals—including the bill banning fur farming, created in cooperation with non-governmental organizations, and the amendment to the act on preventing ASF, commonly known as Lex Ardanowski—they were sent to the legislative freezer – said MP Małgorzata Tracz, who chairs the Parliamentary Teams for a Ban on Fur Farming and for Changes to the Special ASF Act.
Tracz also listed other urgent pro-animal issues, such as introducing mandatory permanent identification (microchipping) and registration of animals in a nationwide electronic database; banning the keeping of dogs on chains; abolishing hunting districts in urban areas; digitizing the process of excluding private plots from hunting districts; restoring mandatory medical examinations for hunters; banning trophy hunting; and banning the hunting of wild birds.
MP Klaudia Jachira, accompanied in the Sejm today by her dog Pyza, recalled that the end of the year is a good time to “defrost” the bill regulating the use of pyrotechnic materials, including fireworks, firecrackers and other devices. – What is innocent fun for some of us is an annual nightmare for animals. Thousands of wild and domestic animals die around New Year’s as a result of enormous stress. Birds fleeing in panic crash into building walls. Dogs and cats die of heart attacks. Wild animals awakened from their winter sleep die because their life cycle has been disrupted. But animals are not the only ones who suffer. Every year on New Year’s Eve, hospital surgical and ophthalmology departments experience a genuine siege. Firefighters, who put out hundreds of house and apartment fires every year, also work particularly hard during this period. And only a handful of firecracker manufacturers and distributors profit from all this – said Klaudia Jachira.
Jachira mentioned other, equally spectacular but less harmful ways for people and animals to celebrate: – More and more local governments, citizens and female citizens are realizing this and consciously giving up the use of pyrotechnic materials. We, the Greens, want to help this silent majority, through a well-written law regulating the issue, in its struggle against the noisy minority that celebrates the arrival of the new year in such an archaic way. We believe that this and other pro-human and pro-animal measures will find a majority in the Sejm during this parliamentary term.
MP Katarzyna Piekarska and MP Paweł Suski from the Parliamentary Team for the Protection of Animal Rights also took part in the conference.