French law commission rejects bullfighting ban; parliament to vote next week

MPs in the French parliament's law commission have rejected calls for a ban on bullfighting. A full parliamentary vote on the issue is due to take place next week.

The issue has split the ruling coalition of President Emmanuel Macron and the biggest opposition party, the far-right National Rally. Former far-right leader and member of parliament, Marine Le Pen, is an animal-lover.

A full vote on the issue is scheduled for 24 November, the first time the National Assembly will consider banning a popular tradition that has been enthusiasticallèy supported by artists from Ernest Hemingway to Pablo Picasso.

The draft law proposes modifying existing animal welfare law to remove exemptions for bullfights. Such events are permitted when they can be shown to be "uninterrupted local traditions".

Exemptions are granted in towns such as Bayonne and Mont-de-Marsan in southwest France, and along the Mediterranean coast including Arles, Beziers and Nimes.

• ¿The last Olé? Left-wing French MP moves to end 'immoral' bullfighting in southern France

"I think the majority of French people share the view that bullfights are immoral, a spectacle that no longer has its place in the 21st century," Aymeric Caron, the left-wing MP behind the attempt to ban bullfighting,told the French news agency AFP earlier this year.

A poll by the Ifop survey group earlier this year supports Caron's claim, with 77 percent of respondents approving a ban, up from 50 percent in 2007.

Most observers expect the bid to fail as a majority of MPs fear a backlash in rural areas and bullfighting heartlands where the practice is a cherished cultural tradition.

"The MP Caron, in a very moralising tone, wants to explain to us, from Paris, what is good or bad in the south," said the mayor of Mont-de-Marsan, Charles Dayot.

Bullfighting is "our identity, a living culture. Leave us alone with our traditions!" added Dayot, who is vice-president of the Union of French Bullfighting Towns.

MPs divided

Although the parliamentary leader of President Macron's Renaissance party, Aurore Bergé, signed an open letter calling for a ban on bullfighting last year, others in the party are fiercely opposed to the bill.

Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti is known to be a bullfighting fan, while some oppose the legislation on the grounds that it will deepen a widening urban-rural divide in France.

"It will disappear on its own. There is less and less of it," said Jean-René Cazeneuve, a ruling party MP elected from the southern Gers region. "There's no point banning it and humiliating people who see it as a tradition."

When running for president earlier this year, Marine Le Pen made animal welfare a plank of her manifesto, promising to give animals a constitutional status and declaring that "wanton mistreatment of animals was intolerable in our society."

She has proposed restricting bullfightinng audiences to over-18s, while MP Julien Odoul, a member of Le Pen's parliamentary group, is expected to vote in favour of a blanket ban.

Judicial attempts to outlaw the practice have repeatedly failed, with courts routinely rejecting lawsuits lodged by animal rights activists, most recently in July 2021 in Nimes.

Earlier this year, a judge in Mexico City ordered an indefinite suspension of bullfighting in the capital's historic bullring, the largest in the world.

Protests

The draft law is likely to encourage protests this weekend. On Saturday, elected representatives from all sides as well as aficionados of the practice will defend bullfighting in several towns.

Animal protection organisations promise demonstrations against the practice on Saturday and Sunday, including "an action with strong visual impact" in Paris.

French actress Brigitte Bardot has given her support to Aymeric Caron, without "any political consideration".

The law would also ban cock-fighting which is permitted in some areas in northern France.

(With AFP)