On
behalf of all Canadians of conscience, I apologize to all the creatures
of this world for the disgrace of Canada's treatment of animals. I
apologize for the disgusting and offensive remarks of Newfoundland and
Labrador premier Danny Williams, a colossally dim-witted man who not
only defended the staggering barbarity of the annual seal hunt that
kills 300,000 seals every year in a bloodbath for fashion that is so
unprofitable it is subsidized by the federal government, but
accused the McCartneys, who are campaigning against this carnage, of
being dupes of the IFAW, Greenpeace and PETA, groups he accused of being
"terrorists". I apologize as well for the federal fisheries minister
Loyola Hearn, who has announced that the new Conservative government fully supports
the continuation of overharvesting policies that have decimated
Canada's fisheries, bankrupted the industry, and wrecked the entire
ecosystems of which fish populations are apart, and has pledged to do
everything he can to block the McCartneys' efforts to end the savagery
of the seal hunt.
I apologize, too, for the shameful behaviour
of all of Canada's political parties for their unwillingness to update
Canada's feeble 1892 animal welfare laws, despite feverish work over
eight long years to bring perfectly modest, reasonable new legislation
to a vote. The politicians were repeatedly bought off by a selfish and
paranoid lobby of farmers, trappers and animal laboratories working
with Big Pharma. As a consequence, Canada's laws against deliberate
cruelty to animals remain the shame of the Western world, and will
inevitably encourage yet more puppy farms, neglect and abuse of farmed
animals, and barbaric treatment of laboratory animals.
I
apologize for the abomination of Western Canadian oil development
(especially the tar sands development which is producing the greatest
environmental devastation in Canada's history), and Western Canadian
logging and mining, which lays waste thousands of square miles of
Canadian wilderness every year, driving wild animals further and
further into the mountains and tundra, all so that mostly foreign-owned
corporations can ship raw logs, coal and other minerals to Asia to be
converted into shoddy manufactured products that are then sold back to
hapless Canadians at a profit.
I apologize for the disgrace of
Canada's hydro-electric industry, which, mostly under government
auspices, has flooded hundreds of thousands of acres of wilderness to
allow dams to be built that produce cheap energy, much of which is
exported to the US and which has delayed investment in the development
of renewable energy technologies and generators.
I apologize for
the many Canadian farmers who have sold out family farms for a quick
buck to developers and agribusiness, and for the politicians who
allowed the development and agribusiness and agricultural chemical
lobbies to distort land and food markets so that the family farm was
ludicrously rendered 'uneconomic'. And I apologize for the farmers who,
almost without a thought, will kill thousands or millions of tightly
confined animals at the first sign that this confinement has produced
inevitable disease epidemics, will soak the confinement areas in toxic
chemicals in accordance with government orders, and will then, a few
months later, start buying and breeding new stocks of animals for
confinement so that this mindless carnage can be repeated again and
again.
We live in a country of staggering wealth, one that has
the space and the resources to be a model for the world in the way in
which we treat all life. Instead, the treatment of animals is Canada's
shame.
Last month I endorsed David Suzuki's 10-point plan
for Sustainability Within a Generation. I believe this plan needs an
11th point, one that pledges that all government laws, regulations and
policies should ensure respect for all life on Earth. Suzuki, Canada's
leading spokesman for environmental responsibility, speaks of the need
to strive for a "sacred balance".
We have a long, long way to go. |
MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
