Animal Law
Buglife’s Big Day in Court
Posted Feb 22, 2008, 05:56 pm CDT
By Martha Neil
A nonprofit conservation trust for invertebrates was to appear in High Court in the United Kingdom today, to argue that a rare teddy-bear-like spider has a right to life under recently enacted animal protection laws.
Buglife was expected to contend that a developer who wants to build a mail distribution center and parking lot on the jumping spider's habitat hasn't done the required environment impact study and hasn't tried hard enough to find an alternative site, reports the London Times. It appears that the challenge may be the first court case to be brought under the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act of 2006.
The law "places a legal duty on all public bodies to have regard to the conservation of important species," as the newspaper puts it.
“The planet is on the crest of the biggest extinction event since the dinosaurs died out," says Matt Shardlow, who serves as executive director of Buglife. "It is generally accepted that pushing species towards extinction is immoral; this case will tell us if our laws and planning policies enshrine this principle and protect the future health of the planet."
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