'Can Mr Benn really be unmoved by these pitiful sounds of slaughter?

Last updated at 6:41 PM on 29th August 2009

The old dairy cow makes her way into the narrow pen. She is terribly thin; every
bone sticks out.

No one has bothered to milk her, so her udder strains obscenely near her hooves.

She has spent her life giving milk to us; she has had seven or eight calves taken
away.

In the queue ahead of her, another dairy cow is so terrified she bellows and twists
her head, frantically trying to turn.

Her head is clamped, a bolt put in her brain. In the butchery department, her head
is almost severed: regulations to prevent BSE mean her spinal cord is left intact.

A man starts to hack off her left front hoof. Incredibly, the cow bends it, then
moves the other front leg away, over and over again.

In another pen, a group of pigs wait to be stunned. The man uses electric tongs
on a pig but instead of ensuring a shock of perhaps two or three seconds, he
merely brushes the pig's head.

It staggers around, desperately trying to stand, so the man tongs another pig
instead, and then another, leaving the first to recover before he goes back to it.

A group of lambs are in the pen now, suckling at their mothers. A ewe is
stunned as her youngster suckles; as the mother is dragged away, her throat
slit in plain view, the lamb bleats, confused, and tries to suckle elsewhere.

In another group, as the last one or two lambs are left, they try to escape.
One scrambles into a bucket.

The noise of their bleating is unbearable but what is worse is that the men, who
have daubed a graffito, Death Row, on the walls, address the animals,
who have done nothing wrong other than to be born, as 'bastards' and worse.

All of the scenes above were shot using concealed cameras put in place by
Animal Aid, a national campaign group, in three British slaughter houses.


The film belies the notion of 'humane' slaughter, of the comforting thought that
buying British is some sort of guarantee that no animal suffered unnecessarily.

Regulations and guidelines are routinely flouted. That youngsters should be
dispatched first. That animals should be stunned only once.

If you watch the scene where the lambs, most of which are the size of cats, are
trying to escape, you can clearly see that they feel fear.

Poorly stunned animals can be seen coming to, as they have not been dispatched
within the recommended 15-second window.

There is one scene that particularly turns my stomach, and I'm vegan, so God
only knows how a meat eater will feel viewing this segment.

A ewe is so sick, she is brought into the pen in a wheelbarrow, where she lies,
waiting, unable to move, before she is tonged and shackled.

'Slaughterhouses are not pleasant places,' Jason Aldiss, president of the
Veterinary Health Association, whose members monitor abattoirs, told me,
having watched the footage.

'Much of what I observed is the usual slaughterhouse environment.'

In the film it's clear the suffering is not isolated: 99.6 per cent of pigs filmed at
one abattoir were not stunned in accordance with guidelines.

Most were stunned at least twice; several four times. At another, out of 90 sheep
killed in one session, only one per cent were killed within the 15-second guideline.

Aldiss agreed that 'some of the practices in the video clip are utterly appalling
and cannot in any way be condoned. Action must be taken directly and immediately'.

I showed the footage to the Rev Prof Andrew Linzey, director of the Oxford Centre
for Animal Ethics, who told me the footage raises 'disturbing questions about the
meaning and effectiveness of existing slaughter regulations'.

'DEFRA says that, "It is an absolute offence to cause or permit an animal avoidable
excitement, pain or suffering."

'Now is the time for DEFRA to show these words mean something by ordering a
full investigation.'

I contacted the offices of Hilary Benn, Secretary of State, the man ultimately in
charge of DEFRA, to tell him I don't want my taxes - the average dairy farm
receives a subsidy of £32,000 each year - subsidising terror and disrespect, but
he has so far failed to phone me back.

Why does the Government protect the meat and dairy industries - which are all
about producing a lot of food quickly and cheaply - so vigorously, while we are
fatter and unhealthier than ever before?

Gordon Brown's appointment of Arlene Phillips as a 'dance guru' would be
laughable were it not so sick.

If, today, you are planning a roast lunch, then you are complicit in what is happening.
Please follow the link below, watch the footage and decide whether this is something
you can stomach. Visit http://www.animalaid.org.uk/go/10min .

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1209923/Can-Mr-Benn-really-unmoved-pitiful-sounds-slaughter.html

ALL of this is avoidable.