Public says No to relaxing wolf protection

Game reserves help protect rare and endangered animals and their habitats.

Hunting is prohibited there, unless it is necessary for the preservation of biodiversity or to prevent excessive wildlife damage. In such cases, wild animals may be culled.

The fact that today even the protected ibex may be killed in these protected areas is, unfortunately, uncontested in politics. However, the National Council had initially refused to allow wolves to be shot there as well.

The Council of States, on the other hand, wanted to permit wolf culls in these areas. In the third round of deliberations in the National Council this week, a strong centre-right minority turned the tide, and the National Council narrowly followed the Council of States with 92 votes to 91, with 2 abstentions.

Several speakers referred to the planned referendum by environmental organisations against the revised hunting law. They warned that overloading the proposal would play into the hands of its opponents.

In recent years, this parliament has repeatedly sided against nature and environmental protection, with the active support of hobby hunters.

It is extremely important to vote wisely on 20 October, when a new parliament is elected. You can easily look up who has consistently voted against nature — for example, on the hunting and protection law: ecorating.ch

Pro Natura Survey

The opinion research institute GFS Zurich, commissioned by the environmental organisation Pro Natura, surveyed a total of 1’006 adults in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland between 13 May and 3 June; the margin of error is plus/minus 3.2 percent.

Referendum is planned

The revision of the Hunting and Protection Act, which has been underway for several years, provides not only for the regulation of the ibex and the wolf, but also of the mute swan. In future, it is to become easier for hunting authorities to shoot certain protected animals that cause conflicts, or to curb the growth of their populations. Case in point: the Federal Council and Parliament perversely want to shoot young wolves from packs before any damage has occurred.

Environmental organisations therefore speak of “preemptive culling”, which could threaten the survival of endangered species. Supporters of the legislative revision counter that neither the ibex, nor the wolf, nor the mute swan are endangered species.

The main points of criticism behind the referendum are three red lines that will not be tolerated:

A) The transfer of regulatory authority from the federal government to the cantons (this contradicts the constitutional mandate on species protection and also makes compliance with international agreements such as the Bern Convention more difficult).

B) The shooting of protected wild animals “on a precautionary basis”. This means that in future, protected species could be regulated without preventive measures first having been taken to avert potential harm. This would effectively allow protected species to be shot as a precautionary measure.

C) The letter c in the new Article 7a of the law, which would allow the Federal Council to designate additional protected species as subject to regulation at any time, undemocratically by way of ordinance, bypassing Parliament and the electorate.

For environmental organisations, it is clear that the wolf is merely the “gateway” to a general loosening of species protection. The lynx, grey heron, goosander, and beaver have already been discussed; there is a parliamentary mandate (the Niederberger motion) to list the mute swan, and further so-called “conflict species” could be added in future (the Eurasian otter, golden eagle, and further heron species).

Next week's conciliation conference is the latest chapter in the ongoing differences between the National Council and the Council of States regarding the regulation of protected animal species in general. If it fails, the revision is off the table. Should the two parliamentary chambers nevertheless reach agreement, environmental organisations are resolute: they will launch a referendum against the legislative revision. The final say would then rest with the electorate.

The referendum itself requires no text (unlike a popular initiative) — it simply rejects the new hunting and protection law. In other words, if the referendum succeeds, the current JSG remains in force, and politicians would have spent, embarrassingly, over a decade legislating against the will of the majority and against animal and species protection.