Day 114 - 04 Apr 95 - Page 70
1
2 Q. Do you agree?
3 A. Yes.
4
5 Q. At the end of that little section there is, "It is
6 desirable that the stun to stick interval be less than 30
7 seconds" with that kind of percussion stunning?
8 A. Yes.
9
10 Q. When you spoke of 30 seconds you were not thinking of a
11 different kind of stunner, were you?
12 A. No. I was influenced by this because I thought that if
13 the minimum time is 30 seconds, to be safest one should
14 adopt that standard.
15
16 Q. Would you mind just reading "Assessing an effective stun",
17 which runs down that final column?
18 A. Yes.
19
20 Q. And then for two or three inches on the following page.
21 Take your time. There is no rush.
22 A. I have read down to "Safety Aspects".
23
24 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Until you come to "Safety Aspects". Do you
25 accept that, or is there anything you disagree with what
26 Dr. Gregory apparently wrote there about assessing an
27 effective stun?
28 A. Yes, I think that is acceptable, except that in factory
29 conditions it is very often to make those judgments, for
30 instance, waiting around to look at the possibility of
31 rhythmic breathing and also the eye movements because if
32 the eye movement -- if the eye response has disappeared,
33 then the animal has been stunned; but if the eye movement
34 is still present it may be stunned or it may not.
35 Sometimes it is assumed that you should not need to use
36 that because it is an unreliable test. As I understand
37 these things, and my observations, the animal must have
38 lost its eye reflex flicking its eye to see if it blinks,
39 and sometimes in the hustle and bustle of a slaughterhouse
40 certainly not done with every animal that is stunned. That
41 is why I have my reservations that one should operate to
42 the most expeditious progress to the next stage. It seems
43 to me that the difference here is that I am being asked to
44 accept that two minutes would be acceptable.
45
46 Q. No, I am not back on the two minutes. I am purely asking
47 you if you accept that as accurate?
48 A. If all of that could be seen to occur, then, yes, that
49 would be a good stun. But when I say "a good stun", I mean
50 that I am still not satisfied that the animal might not,
51 after some minutes, if it were not to progress further,
52 recover to some extent.
53
54 MR. RAMPTON: Can I ask Dr. Long on what you base that judgment?
55 A. I base it mainly on what I know of human physiology and
56 what I have discussed with physiologists generally.
57
58 Q. It is not based on practical inspection of animals in the
59 slaughterhouse recovering from what was, apparently, an
60 effective stun?
