Posted on 28 July 2009
www.sealsonline.org
Ottawa, July 28, 2009 – In response to the European Union’s unacceptable decision to boycott seal products, Senator Céline Hervieux-Payette is calling on the Canadian government to support the sealing industry with immediate financial compensation, until such time as the WTO hands down its decision.
“I will be writing this week to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to say that I am 100% behind the appeal to the WTO but that by itself it’s nowhere near enough,” the Senator said. “The Harper government has given GM and the automobile industry's wage earners billions in assistance; I can't believe that we will let the Canadians on the East Coast go under for much less than that.”
The Senator recalled that she and her Conservative colleague the Honourable Gérald Comeau had approached the Parliamentary Restaurant to have seal meat added to the menu. “Judging by what I’ve been told, that could happen this fall,” she said. “When one of our country's industries is the subject of such unfair attacks, we have to close ranks.” She appealed to all Canadians to support their fellow citizens.
Deploring the total failure of the strategy adopted by the Harper government, which for the past three years has refused to listen to industry advice, and worried by the capitulation of Europe’s elected representatives and governments in the face of the vegetarian lobby, the Senator stressed that the Universal Declaration on the Ethical Harvest of Seals is the only possible way to guarantee the survival of the sealing industry in Canada and throughout the world.
“An ethical seal hunt is essential,” the Senator concluded, “both for those who depend on it to earn a living and for those who consume seal products because they are ecologically sound and useful for human health.”
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Maximilien Depontailler
Policy Advisor
Office of the Honourable Céline Hervieux-Payette, PC
613-947-8008 – deponm@sen.parl.gc.ca