Day 291 - 31 Oct 96 - Page 23
1 "I have to point out with cows that we are dealing here
2 with a survival mechanism. We are talking about giving
3 birth and producing milk. Many other systems will be
4 suffering before a cow, or any other animal for that
5 matter, abandons those because that is a survival mechanism
6 which will go on even if she is emaciated and in poor
7 condition."
8
9 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
10
11 MS. STEEL: Talking about markets, cattle markets in
12 particular, which is obviously relevant seeing as
13 McDonald's cattle come very frequently from cattle markets,
14 Dr. Long had been talking about bad husbandry and bad
15 stockmanship and he was asked, "What kind of prevalence
16 does that kind of treatment of animals, or what kind of
17 prevalence is there for that in markets?" He said, "It is
18 more or less a day to day occurrence", and that you would
19 see distressed animals being pushed unnecessarily. I think
20 he was mainly talking about the use of goads and the
21 loading and unloading conditions.
22
23 He said, "It should not, with good stockmanship, be
24 necessary to use those forms of force at all. You should
25 be able to run the place without using sticks, and very
26 rarely with goads. The trouble is that many of these
27 markets are inadequate for the job. They are trying to put
28 too much through, trying to do too much business at the
29 expense of the animals' welfare."
30
31 On day 113, page 41, he criticised the kind of diet that
32 was fed to cattle. He said he had a great deal of concern
33 about the diet because it was too high a protein diet for
34 an animal which is typically a ruminant, it upsets the
35 digestion and a number of digestive troubles result. That
36 you did not get good rumination, and, although it was not
37 fully understood how this took place, it contributed to the
38 causes of lameness. He also said, "What concerns us most
39 now is the effect of feed on the development of BSE. That
40 is very much a welfare matter, because cows that are
41 suffering from BSE do suffer a great deal." That was as a
42 result of feeding animal remains to cattle.
43
44 Just as a general matter, on day 113, page 45, he said that
45 there were about 450 abattoirs in the UK at present. He
46 said about 80 percent of that number would slaughter
47 cattle, probably. I can't remember where this came up, but
48 there is a reference in the transcript on page 45, line 13
49 to McKeys using up to 70 abattoirs. Effectively, that is
50 about one in six abattoirs that they would be getting... I
51 don't know whether that is... Presumably, it is all
52 cattle. But, effectively, if they are using that many
53 abattoirs the conditions in those abattoirs are going to be
54 effectively bog standard for the rest of the industry. So
55 any general criticisms made by welfare organisations or by
56 governmental bodies or governmental quangos, whatever, are
57 going to apply to the animals which are being reared for
58 McDonald's products.
59
60 When he was asked about whether or not cattle went
