Agriculture committee  We haven't updated our regulations in 40 years, since 1977. In that time, we've had slaughterhouses consolidating, farms consolidating. The landscape has been changing, but that doesn't change the fundamental reality that [Technical difficulty—Editor]. Again, the regulatory nee

Agriculture committee  Animals under the law are property, but they are a special kind of property. The law doesn't really explicitly recognize that, but it does implicitly recognize that. Quebec's move to classify animals as sentient beings was an explicit move toward that. For example, it's a crimin

Agriculture committee  Thank you very much for the opportunity to be here today to speak on behalf of animals. Because my special expertise is in law, I'd like to open with some comments about the role of regulation in a democracy. Regulators exist to protect the public interest, not to protect the in