Is Canada’s seal hunt ‘sacred’?

An earlier In Box post looked at the ethics of Canada’s seal hunt.
Here’s more on the politics of that issue.

Elizabeth Payne is on the Ottawa Citizen’s editorial board. In today’s paper she writes:

You can debate abortion, the death penalty, polygamy, burqas, even UFOs, and get a polite hearing. But not the seal hunt. That is one subject that, on the Canadian political landscape, will get you put on an ice floe in a hurry. Go there at your own peril…

Payne goes on to describe Senator Mac Harb’s struggle to introduce a private member’s bill on the issue. Harb says he supports the sealers, but thinks their market is probably gone. He wants to examine the viability of the hunt and at least consider a ban.

But when he introduced that bill last year, it was met with a resounding silence. Not a single senator could be found to second it, which meant there could be no debate. “I was stunned.” Harb was told such a thing had never happened before. That, he argues, is what the Senate is for — a place to discuss “difficult issues that the House of Commons doesn’t want to discuss.”

Harb tried again last week. A fellow senator agreed to second the bill, on the principle of permitting debate.

“I know some of my colleagues are upset. They have a right to be upset, that is fine,” he said, “but I should also have a right to bring the issue forward.”

Read Payne’s full column here.