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ARCHIVED - More jail time for abusing a dog than a person: why the new Animal Welfare Law in Spain is causing ructions
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Certain animal abuse cases in Spain now carry harsher punishments that assault and gender inequality in the workplace
Spain drafted pioneering legislation during the summer that goes further than ever before to protect the rights of animals, but the new bill is this week causing a stir for all the wrong reasons. Ahead of a full discussion on Thursday November 24, the General Council of the Judiciary has warned that the draft law against animal abuse “may compromise the principle of proportionality” when it comes to crimes being punished.
One of the cornerstones of the legislation is tougher punishment for serious acts of animal abuse and neglect, but the problem is that now, the sanctions associated with injuring a vertebrate animal are equivalent to those handed down for minor offences against people.
Moreover, if a person is found guilty of harming an animal to upset or distress their spouse, the punishment is actually harsher than several other pretty serious offences, such as coercion, causing personal injury that doesn’t require medical attention and even certain instances of gender inequality in the workplace.
Essentially, abusing a dog can result in between 3 and 18 months in prison; the non-serious assault of a man or woman carries a maximum sentence of just one year.
The Ministry of Social Rights has argued that “it is false” that the new animal protection law punishes crimes against pets more harshly than those against people.
The highest penalties are linked to cases of "vicarious violence" in which an abuser harms the animal to harm their spouse. In these cases, "harm is done to the animal and also to the person" and the penalty is, therefore, greater.
Another criticism of the law is that it no longer refers to the abuse of domestic animals specifically (they used to be referred to as “under human control”) but to “any vertebrate animal,” which the CGPJ warns could lead to a conflict with Spain’s pre-existing hunting and fishing laws.
On this point, however, the Ministry is unmoving: “Until now, burning a fox alive or drowning a wild boar calf had no criminal reproach. This law comes to put an end to impunity for animal abusers that, until now, was almost total in Spain,” a spokesperson said, stressing that the legislation change is absolutely “essential.”
Image: Freepik
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