| Archive for Downsizer For an ethical approach to consumption |
| jema |
Slaughterhouse on BBC2Just do not know where to start
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| Guest |
My god where do they get the employees ? Not a good advert for humane killing of animals !!! or at least the attitude, respect of them.. | ||||
| Hedgey |
That was me by the way !! | ||||
| Jonnyboy |
Shocking as expected, riddled with animal cruelty - as expected. I was left feeling that the Halal & Kosher slaughtermen had far more respect for the animals than the so called 'humane' slaughtermen.
I think the the programme could have taught more of a lesson, the fear of the animal was glossed over, and I saw no need for it to descend into a social commentary on oldham's problems; there are racists in all walks of society, this seemed to insinuate that it was a problem for the working class. I was left feeling that this was a missed opportunity, but glad it was on at all. |
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| jema |
I actually thought the social commentary said a lot.... |
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| Jonnyboy |
About slaughterhouses, why? you would have got the same answers in any section of industry if you went looking for them. They made little effort to balance the racist comments. Highly suspect editing. |
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| jema |
I think it said quite a bit about a job which is about the dregs of the dregs of employment. A lot of the employees were more than a little challenged in the use of the opposing thumb 
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| Mad Dad |
Only caught the last 10 mins (work) and they appeared to have no respect for each other, the baiting of the cleaner everytime he was anywhere near and it being condoned by the management being a good example, that there was never going to be any respect for the animals.... | ||||
| Treacodactyl |
They certainly should have spent more time on the animals. Watching some of the animals being mistreated before being stunned I thought it actually portrayed Halal & Kosher as being better.
The main thing I felt is if you take your own animals to a slaughter house how on earth to you ensure they are treated well and then not cross contaminated with all the rubbish in the slaughterhouse? Dragging the dead pigs across the floor etc. |
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| Wombat |
I, as some of you may know, go down the veggie route, but am not squeamish as I also shoot pheasant, rabbit, duck, etc. I have been contemplating eating meat again after 24yrs + veggie, as we now have our own pigs & sheep and were happy that we knew where the meat was coming from and how it had been treated.
This prog as put me off completely. I can look after my animals in whatever way I wish, but once in the hands of those types of morons, anything could happen. How can I send an animal I have enjoyed rearing, feeding, having some sort of relationship with, then hand it over? Glad the prog was shown/made, but what a bunch of disrespectful morons. Wombat PS I also felt quite sad about a few of the blokes, as they all seemed to have really bad upbringings. Perhaps that's why the main moron (tattoo man) was so happy sticking that knife in the pigs neck/heart with such joy and little respect. |
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| jema |
It did make religeous slaughter look better by a mile, something done with thought and respect. The other morons were something else they made eugenics seem like a good idea
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| Behemoth |
Not happy viewing on several levels. I could actually watch the slaughter house part of it, glad it was shown and echo the comments above but gave up when they went into social commentary. Didn't know who to feel sorry for, the animals that were treated with borderline cruelty or the social inadequacy of the workers interviewed. Seemed to strenghten the arguement for small local slaughter houses where people take pride in their trade and respect for the animals, not thier production line, but this place was billed as a small local slaughterhouse 
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| judith |
I didn't see this program, but where was the vet in all of this? There has to be one on the premises. | ||||
| jema |
I missed the first 15mins, but saw no sign of a vet  Good point about this being meant to be about a small slaughterhouse, did not seem at all small to me.
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| Behemoth |
I didn't see the vet either but the inspection job is often given to new and inexperienced (young) vets. My vet mate did this as his first job and he said you had to be very brave to interupt the production line and start condeming carcasses. You saw who worked there, they have sharp knives, they are on a production bonus for each shift, you're on your own and 25 years old. I wonder if the introduction of the Polish workers will change things. | ||||
| jema |
I would not have fancied arguing with that lot last night 
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| judith |
The place that I took my pigs had room for precisely one trailer to pull up at a time. They were the only animals in the holding area when I left, which meant that they were the next in line - no waiting around. We were greeted by the vet and the trading standards person, who looked the pigs over before they went into the holding area. I could see into the initial cutting area when I went through to do the paperwork - although it is not the sort of place I would want to spend a lot of time, it was certainly clean and tidy and all the carcases were up in the air, and not on the ground. That's what I think of as a small slaughterhouse. It wasn't exactly a pleasant experience, but I certainly had no qualms about it on welfare grounds. |
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| Behemoth |
That sounds like the ideal but rare, perhaps in industry terms 'small' is getting bigger, or such a place would not have made such a 'good' tv programme. | ||||
| judith |
That is sadly true. A neighbour took a couple of lambs to the other abattoir within easy reach of us - he said it was horrible. Very much the factory scenario, and the lambs were left penned up without food or water for 24 hours before slaughter. When he asked for the offal, he was given a bag containing 6 kidneys. Now I'm no biologist, but I do seem to remember that most animals have just the two each, which does make you wonder whose sheep they actually came from. |
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| Behemoth |
I was suprised at the amount of waste in terms of offal and heads etc. I've tried to get lambs tongues but they are chucked out with the head as the head is condemend and they can't be bothered cutting the tongues out. | ||||
| judith |
That was my only complaint about the abattoir that I went to - I didn't get any of the offal. The message either didn't get through to the cutting room, or it was conveniently ignored! Although with pigs, you do get the head, and therefore the tongue as well. The brawn was fantastic!
I suppose it is back to consumer demand. If there is sufficient clamour for lambs' tongues and other offals, then it will be more profitable for the abattoirs to provide it than just to send it for disposal, dog food, or whatever. |
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| Andy B |
Well where do you start, It seems pretty pointless to put high animal wellfare standards in place to then treat them like that at the end. Both the jewish and muslim people seemed better and more concerned with the welfare of the animal. The people that worked their seemed almost sub human/ a bit dim!!!!!!!!! And do you need to be like that to work their without going mad or does working their send you a bit mad / nasty. Broken lives, broken homes, if they treat each other like shit then they aren't going to treat animals well. I got the feeling that their was plenty of scope for serious mistreatment of the animals. And what is it in Polish society that they can have people with so little opportunities that they have to work abroad but just have a much better work ethic than people here.
As usual money talks, you get paid bonuses for speed which means you cut corners which means standard drop which leads to cruelty, which means a sentient being faces an unnessecarly brutal and frightning death. So about the spelling, it gets worse when i am angry. |
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| Nanny |
slaughterhousei didn't see the programme and i am very glad i didn't as we have sent animals off to be done and george is due to go in nov.the last time we sent animals to the slaughterhouse it was a pair of sheep that we had cared for and bottle fed etc. the nearest slaughterhouse that would take them at that time was earsham in norfolk......only about 40 minutes away so my husband took did the transport. he was told to make sure he was at the door of the slaughterhouse before the main opening time so had to be there at 6.30am i seem to recall. he unloaded (was praised for their cleanliness) and saw them into the holding pens, the only animals there. by the time he put the back of the trailer up and drove round to collect the skins and do any paper work they were finished and done - couldn't have been more than 20 minutes all told. this was a small slaughter house and though mr nanny didn't find it a particularly enjoyable experience, he was happy that the deed was done as quickly and humanly as could be. perhaps yet again we are victims of a telly prog that only shows the worst and ignores the more normal? i don't know that's true but would certainly like to believe it....... 
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| tahir |
I'm glad it was on, it was probably a fair representation of the typical medium sized abbatoir, the one I used to go to with my dad was staffed by racist thugs who enjoyed seeing if they could splash the "paki" punters with blood and guts (the punters used to be allowed a lot nearer to the process in those days) the only person that had any respect for the animal was the muslim slaughterman.
There's a lot to get worked up about in terms of animal welfare in the meat industry but I'd say halal/kosher is not an issue especially as the sheep were stunned before killing. |
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| judith |
So is it the norm these days for halal/kosher meat to be stunned first? I know we sometimes get the google ad for "unstunned halal meat" - is it thought that the unstunned animal bleeds out more thoroughly or is it a tradition thing? |
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| tahir |
The idea is that the animal should be conscious when it's killed, most muslims nowadays accept stunning, I've got no figures but I believe that a large perecentage of halal meat is now stunned before killing but kosher regulations still demand that the animal is conscious at death. |
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| Behemoth |
I've popped over to RC earlier today and no-one appears to be talking about this. Strange.
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| Jonnyboy |
I have no issue with halal/kosher slaughter, especially if practised in a similar way to the film. The actual death seemed to be fairly quick, the cut was huge, I was quite surprised at that. | ||||
| tahir |
There's no guarantee that all slaughtermen are as good or caring as those in the film but I'd certainly hope that they are because the welfare of the animal up to and including it's death is of great signifigance in both religions. |
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| tahir |
Is there a league table of meat consumption in the western world? I'd be interested to know where we stand. | ||||
| Rebecca |
I, like many others, was appalled by the programme on BBC2.
Unlike many others, my family own and run a small abattoir in the North West of England (Standish, near Wigan) and the one on TV last night, was certainly not what I would consider to be small, it was what is known as "medium". It's not a mass production line but neither is it like the one run by my family and many other small slaughterhouses that I have visited, where quite often the number of Meat Hygiene Service officials outnumbers the slaughtermen. I cannot believe the behaviour of some of the staff employed at this abattoir nor the attitude of the owner, who in failing to address the problems, could be considered to have condoned the behaviour. Somebody had stuck a cigarette butt into the mouth of a sheep's head (in the waste, awaiting collection). Skin and fleece was picked up from the floor and thrown at one of the young men working as a cleaner. The noise in the slaughterhouse was, from my point of view, totally unacceptable and these men seemed to have a total lack of respect for the job they were being paid to do and most importantly, for the animals. As an Official Veterinary Surgeon (OVS) and a Meat Hygiene Inspector are legally required to be on site at all times when slaughtering is taking place, I cannot understand why certain things were allowed to happen. The OVS is responsible for animal welfare so why were the animals being kicked without us seeing any intervention? Did he intervene and this was not shown? Who knows? I would not dispute the argument that most people fall into the slaughter and meat industry because they can't get a job anywhere else but that does not excuse the behaviour and attitudes portrayed last night. Our abattoir is part of our business and the slaughtermen are multi-skilled in that not only do they kill the animals, they then break down the carcasses and prepare the meat for sale to our customers. I am proud to say that at all times the young men working in the abattoir alongside my father and brother show compassion and respect for the animals and an immense pride in the task they have to do. Contrary to what the programme claimed, not all workers in abattoirs are apathetic with little interest in their local community and/or politics. As some of you on this site will know, we recorded the slaughter process of beef and lamb just after Christmas and posted it on our website. We have received many emails - all of them positive. In particular, one that sticks in my mind was from a young veterinary student. As part of her training, she had to spend a week in an abattoir and was dreading it. She watched the process on our website and took the time to contact us to say thank you because although she was not looking forward to it, she now knew what to expect and was certainly less apprehensive. Finally, each industry has its share of good and bad - sadly, as far as the meat industry goes - there seems to be a consensus of opinion that bad businesses make better television! |
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| tahir |
Agree, it's sad that viewers were left with an overwhemingly negative view of the meat industry |
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| Behemoth |
Well said | ||||
| judith |
And because of the increased regulation, combined with the cost of paying to have the OVS on site, the small abattoirs are finding it increasingly difficult to survive.
Again this is down to consumer demand. Because most consumers want cheap prices and, more importantly, don't want to think where their meat has come from, the big production lines, where the animals are treated as inanimate products, will be able to get away with this. |
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| Rebecca |
You're right, Judith, the increased regulations are causing problems and Dad has gone to London today to meet with the Meat Hygiene Service and other industry representatives to discuss these.
At the moment, we are fortunate in that our campaign to introduce the headage rate was successful and the presence of an OVS no longer costs us an excessive amount of money. We pay a fixed rate per animal killed. This has helped small abattoirs tremendously although the new regulations do allow for headage rate to be removed and the old charges to be re-introduced. We (Dad and me) went to Brussels just before Christmas to discuss the impact of the regulations with those people responsible for implementing them. Interestingly, after years of being told to blame Brussels, it would appear that it is the way our government is interpreting the latest batch of regulations that is causing the problems. These regulations allow member states to implement exemptions or derogations (known as national measures) to allow the traditional or small producers of food to continue. SAFE (Small Abattoir Federation) has drawn up 3 documents suggesting national measures for the government to implement with would help to ensure the survival of smaller abattoirs and these are currently being considered by the Food Standards Agency. It is sad that last night's programme insisted on referring to the abattoir featured as small. Sadly, those with no knowledge of the industry may well believe that what was portrayed last night is typical of a small abattoir and reinforces the belief, misplaced in my opinion, that big plants have higher standards. However, I have to be honest and say that if I was buying meat from a butcher that I knew was supplied by the abattoir shown, I'd be asking a few questions before buying my meat there this week. |
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| tahir |
Is there any way that we as consumers can support the SAFE initiative? | ||||
| Rebecca |
As consumers, I think the most important thing you can do, although it may not be easy, is to find an independent local butcher whose meat comes from a small, local abattoir (not necessarily his own) which sources its animals from local farms.
Before buying any meat from anywhere, perhaps we should all take the time to think about where the animal came from. For example: How far did the animal travel to be slaughtered? Was it killed humanely? How far did the carcass travel to be cut? How far did the meat travel to be packed? As I said, there are good and bad in all sectors of the industry and just because something is small does not mean it is better but I know many owners of small abattoirs and recommend each and every one of them. |
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| tahir |
Do any of your members do halal or kosher? | ||||
| footprints |
slaughter houseI didn't see the prog. All reality tv can be posted where the sun isn't.My wife tells me that they have trading standards officers at the slaughterhouse, just as they do at the sales. Trading standards will not allow you to move livestock without the correct paperwork, suitable trailer/transport, and when we went to try a buy a couple of pigs we were told not to go without a bag of straw because they would'nt let you load the animals without! Where were trading standards? |
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| Nanny |
slaughterhousethank you rebecca for all that.............it makes me feel better about the whole thing........................there are indeed bad practices in every industry and it is heartening to hear someone like yourself tell the good side just wish we as the public were better informed than what was apparently shown last night |
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| Andy B |
Well i know that things can be edited to look worse than they are, because that seems to be the favoured way of reality TV. But this was more fly on the wall to me, and I accept that there is good and bad, but did the person making the program just look around for a bad one, or was this the only one honest / daft enough to let him film.
When there was the abattoir thing in that food program when he picked the cow and watched it being slaughtered and got upset about it ( I cant remember the name of the program ) The people working at that abattoir didn't want there faces showing because they feared reprisals. So why were this lot so open and did they tone things down for the camera or play them up. Another thing thats wound me up is that i told a lot of work collegues about the program and asked them to watch it, not one did. "Dont like to see such things" How do you know if you cant be bothered to watch it. They arent bad people, just dont care!!! 
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| Rebecca |
Re: slaughter house
We have never had trading standards present at our abattoir during the slaughter process although they will make random, unannounced visits to check that you are keeping animal movement records. As far as I know, they have no authority in slaughterhouses although I think that many years ago when slaughterhouses were under local authority control, they used to. The Meat Hygiene Service, part of the Food Standards Agency, now control slaughterhouses throughout the country. We have no problems allowing our slaughter process to be filmed and we have never requested that our identity be kept secret - we have nothing to hide and are open and honest about what we do. The slaughter process has been filmed on several occasions for a number of programmes, including one called "Killers" for Bravo which, like last night's programme, showed the whole process from start to finish, although our end was the presenters eating a steak in the restaurant at the front of our premises. This was an honest and accurate depiction of what it was like to work in a small slaughterhouse - nothing like what we saw last night. |
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| Rebecca |
No they don't. Sorry
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| prow |
I missed the programme in question as it was broadcast while I was on holiday.
Would anyone happe to still have a recording I could borrow ? TIA Phil |
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| hils |
I missed the programme too. Does anyone know what the regulations are for on site slaughtering - ie at the farm, and do you think there is call for a visiting slaughtersman/butcher to do the deed on site? | ||||
| tahir |
Hi Phil I've got it recorded but it's on my Sky+ and I haven't got a VCR or DVDR sorry
If you've got digital it's worth keeping an eye on BBC4, they sometimes repeat documentaries. |
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| tahir |
You can home slaughter but unless it's game or poultry anything you slaughter at home can only legally eaten by the farmer. There was a post about it a couple of weeks ago, I'll repost if i find it. |
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| tahir |
Here it is:
http://forum.downsizer.net/viewtopic.php?t=5159&highlight=slaughter |
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| mr x |
slaghterhousethe program the slaghterhouse was a load of rubbish i no many slaghtermen and it isnt like that that was a stunt to turn the public against the slaghtermen that does his job respectivly for the welfare |