Day 114 - 04 Apr 95 - Page 58
1 modern intensive farming unit?
2 A. No.
3
4 Q. You have no veterinary qualification?
5 A. No.
6
7 Q. You worked I think you told us for 44 years in the
8 pharmaceutical industry?
9 A. Yes.
10
11 Q. Was that a full-time job?
12 A. Yes.
13
14 Q. So when did you do your animal welfare work?
15 A. Weekends, evenings, I took holidays, that sort of
16 thing.
17
18 Q. You have conveyed a great deal of information to his
19 Lordship over the last two days. How much of that, broadly
20 speaking, is the result of direct observation and how much
21 of reading and talking to other people?
22 A. Both very important because, as an investigator, it is
23 very useful to me to discuss with other people who are
24 doing somewhat similar things and to use my experience to
25 bat ideas about. So I have been making the best use I can
26 of that sort of communication.
27
28 Q. Have you, for example, yourself done any practical work to
29 seek to measure the consciousness or the lack of it after
30 stunning in cattle or pigs or both?
31 A. No. The only work I could do is to observe eye
32 movements, breathing, when I have been on the spot. I have
33 not got a slaughterman's certificate and I have not
34 actually slaughtered an animal.
35
36 Q. Have you done the sort of work which we know that Dr. -- he
37 is now a Professor -- Gregory has done?
38 A. No, I have not. I have had a lot of conversations with
39 Professor Gregory and admire a lot of work he has done,
40 although I am critical in some aspects.
41
42 Q. He is an acknowledged expert in this field of, what shall
43 we say, the impact on animals of modern farming practices
44 and slaughtering, is he not?
45 A. Yes, he is.
46
47 Q. Generally speaking, would you defer to his judgment in
48 matters of this kind?
49 A. I would certainly listen to his evidence but
50 critically.
51
52 Q. If, for example, it was his opinion in the first place,
53 taking cattle, that the time between stunning and sticking
54 is not of prime importance but for various practical
55 reasons should probably be not more than two minutes, would
56 you disagree with that?
57 A. I would not be happy with that. I myself would be more
58 generous to the animal. I would regard myself, if you
59 like, as more of a shop steward for the animal looking at
60 it, particularly from the animal's perspective. I think
