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The three popular petitions for animal welfare, the “no vaccination” and ethics lessons for all have overcome the parliamentary hurdle of 100,000 signatures. The most successful was the animal welfare one from former mushroom politician Sebastian Bohrn Mena. It came with 416,229 signatures or a 6.52 percent turnout of the 6,379,781 voters in 19th place out of 53 referendums, according to results released by the Interior Ministry on Monday night.
259,150 or 4.06 percent of the electorate (259,150) supported the referendum – launched in view of the corona vaccines – with which a group led by former presidential candidate and Christian politician Rudolf Gehring speaks out against discrimination against people who they are not vaccinated. In terms of percentage, it was ranked 30th.
“Ethics for all” and not just as an alternative to confessional education was a concern of 159,979 voters. With 2.51 percent, the referendum held by Eytan Reif from the “Religion is a private matter” initiative was ranked 37.
Even more successful animal protection referendum
There has already been a somewhat more successful grassroots initiative for animal welfare. An initiative launched in 1996 by FPÖ and Green MPs was signed by 459,096 people. That was, with significantly fewer voters at the time, 7.96 percent and therefore ranked 14th.
However, in a broadcast, Bohrn Mena was completely enthusiastic about the great success of his initiative, noting that there was a hard block during the entry week and the issue of Corona dominated the media. And he reinterpreted the result: in an election to the National Council, a party with this number of voters would have won 15 seats. This has achieved “quasi-club status for animal welfare and nature conservation.” Bohrn Mena now wants to get in touch with the parliamentary parties so that as many of their demands as possible can be implemented as soon as possible.
Because that’s anything but safe. With more than 100,000 signatures, a request must be answered by parliament, and 45 of the 53 popular petitions have achieved this goal. But Parliament does not have to follow the demands. This is how the Vienna Conference Center was built, although the referendum initiated by the ÖVP against it was the most successful to date with 1,361,562 signatures and 25.74 percent.
Fisherman’s support
However, Bohrn Mena had outstanding support: the health minister responsible for animal welfare, Rudolf Anschober (Greens), immediately congratulated the initiators in a broadcast. It’s a “fantastic tailwind” for him. Now it will be a question of implementing the demands step by step together with the affected interest groups, for example, together with the Ministry of Agriculture, which must direct its financing towards animal welfare.
The result of a referendum consists of the initially required statements of support (at least 8,401) for the launch of a referendum and the signatures delivered within the week of registration. Since 2018, both can be delivered not only at the municipal office, but also online. For the referendum on animal welfare, 210,431 statements of support were made in the first phase, 62,386 for the “no vaccination” and 61,766 for the “ethics” request. (apa)
