Day 290 - 30 Oct 96 - Page 21
1 Yes, because on day 96.... This is quite odd actually.
2 This is completely different to what he said the first
3 time. Day 96, page 2, I asked him: The system for the
4 piglets after they are removed from their mothers, did you
5 say that it is the same for the indoor as well as the
6 outdoor pigs. Which I am sure he did say the first time
7 round. He said, and this is at line 58 on page 2: No, it
8 is not the same. I believe I described when I was here
9 last time that the outdoor system, pigs are weaned into
10 what we call kennels, then the indoor pigs, they are put
11 into converted traditional buildings. I said: Like a barn
12 that has been converted. And he said: A straw yard, yes,
13 which has been used obviously in various ways in the past.
14 I don't know, he called them indoor kennels.
15
16 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I do not think you need puzzle about what
17 his motives were. It seems to me he may have just
18 misunderstood what he was being asked on the earlier
19 occasion. What you say is the import of it is that outdoor
20 weaners, at least until they are about 40 kilos, go into
21 outdoor kennels and indoor ones go into large barns.
22
23 MS. STEEL: Yes.
24
25 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That is what you say is the ultimate effect
26 of his evidence.
27
28 MS. STEEL: Yes. He said about removing piglets from their
29 mothers at 24 days, quote: I think it would be absolutely
30 wrong to say there is no distress, that is quite wrong,
31 there would be some distress caused. That was on day 88,
32 page 23. He said that when he was a boy, they were weaned
33 at eight weeks. I mean, he said that there would be at
34 every stage, no matter what the age, there would be
35 distress. Obviously, certainly for the piglets it is going
36 to be greater the younger they are. In any event, the fact
37 is that they are caused distress.
38
39 I mean, we have heard about pigs being sociable animals and
40 tending to stick together with their kind of family and so
41 on, and if they were not deliberately separated I am sure
42 that that would carry on.
43
44 The weaners were kept in the kennels, be they indoor or
45 outdoor, depending on the different streams, the two
46 different streams, and that they were brought into the
47 finishing units at 40 kilograms for the outdoor pigs, the
48 freedom foods, and at 30 kilograms from the indoor
49 kennels. The reference for that is day 88, page 8, line
50 28.
51
52 On day 88, page 24, line 53 he said that the 40 kilograms
53 would be at 12 weeks old. And on day 96, page 3, line 26
54 he said that the 30 kilograms would be at aged 9 to 10
55 weeks old.
56
57 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Just pause a moment please. Yes?
58
59 MS. STEEL: He said that the pigs go to slaughter at 90
60 kilograms live weight, which was roughly 25 to 26 weeks
