Tens of thousands of live animals – mainly cows and sheep – are exported, alive, from the UK every year. Sometimes the animals have relatively short journeys – veal calves off to live in intolerable conditions in France or Italy, for example – and sometimes they are exported much further – to Russia, or beyond. Most of the animals are ready for slaughter, and will be killed as soon as they arrive in their destination countries.
This often involves unimaginably long journeys for hundreds of animals at a time, crammed into lorries. Animal welfare campaigners have long condemned the practice as cruel and unnecessary – why ship an animal half way around the world to be slaughtered when it can be killed in the UK and shipped as meat?
Hundreds die of disease, starvation and dehydration on these journeys every year, and UK ports have gradually stopped live exports. The only remaining port where live farm animals depart is Ramsgate in Kent.
And this week, an event occurred that should sound the death knell for live exports from the UK. Animal welfare charity Compassion in World Farming has the details of a lorry that arrived at Ramsgate yesterday:
The lorry was met by RSPCA and Animal Health Inspectors. The detail of what happened next is not yet clear but reports indicate that the lorry was stopped due to vehicle faults. We believe this lorry has been stopped more than once for similar reasons in the past. The true extent to which the lorry was not ‘fit for purpose’ was about to become much clearer.
The sheep were unloaded while the transporters sought a replacement lorry. Two sheep, one with a broken leg, had to be euthanized due to their injuries. Six sheep fell into water after they were moved into an area where the floor collapsed. Four were rescued by RSPCA Officers, but two drowned. The horror of that moment and the swift actions of the RSPCA Officers are sure to be remembered by all involved for a long time.
Following these tragedies a vet examined all the animals. Another 41 were found to be severely lame and had to be euthanized. We have been told that approximately half of that number had foot rot (a very painful condition) or other longer standing illnesses. This report raises the question of how they were judged to be fit to travel?
The other half had broken limbs, dislocated joints or severe muscle damage. Our sources indicate the cause of these dreadful injuries could be found in the lorry. It appears that the hydraulic floors were not fit for purpose and left a gap between the walls and the floor. It is thought that the injured sheep got their limbs caught in the gap during transit.
In all 45 sheep died.
The recent reshuffle saw David Heath, the excellent Lib Dem MP for Somerton and Frome, made a minister in DEFRA, with responsibility for farming. The local council in Ramsgate has suspended live exports temporarily. What a fitting start it would be for the first Lib Dem minister for farming to make the suspension permanent and stop this cruel and unnecessary practice for good.
* Nick Thornsby is a day editor at Lib Dem Voice.
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5 Comments
Factory farming is worse and it occurs on a much bigger scale than live animal transport. Ban that if you want to make a profound impact on animal welfare. Requiring a strict license for pet ownership would also make a huge difference.
I am always dubious when a single extreme example is used to justify banning something. What happened is clearly wrong and clearly needs to be prevented from happening in future but is a total ban really the only way to do this. Certainly there needs to be regulations that ensure that animal’s welfare is protected when they are being transported and those regulations need to be backed up by appropriate levels of enforcement, Maybe transportation should be dependent on a license which is only issued if all welfare regulations are being met, and then destination also has reasonable welfare regulations. I am not saying that a total ban should not be put in place, but rather that a total ban should only be considered once other less draconian measures have been considered and ruled out for some reason,
I agree with with what is written in the article, it is unfair to treat any animal is this way. I support the article, and ask that David Heath in his new position, look into the subject.
Er, aren’t we now supposed to be all about getting rid of regulations in order to boost entrepreneurship, rather than introducing new regulations banning things? Isn’t calling for this ban stopping the entrepreneurship involved in this trade which is bringing jobs and money to the country?
Alternatively, now we’ve seen what’s involved here, can we be quite sure all those regulations which the Conservatives want us to have a “bonfire of” (with the latest Liberal Democrat News coming out in approval) are just unnecessary “red tape” rather than brought in for good reason?
As one of the campaigners who have watched these animals go through the port of Ramsgate I have been given an insight into the true nature of live animal exports.The particular event that caused the Council to suspend trading was not an isolated incident although it was a particularly bad one, merely highlighting what campaigners had been saying for months.
The trade is cruel,unnecessary with the only motivation being money,there is a complete disregard for the welfare of the livestock being moved despite there being stringent regulations in place.If at the end of these horrific journeys the animals are going to be slaughtered there can be no valid arguement against slaughtering at home and shipping meat to the continent,on the hook not on the hoof.