transport « A Compassionate World

Posts Tagged ‘transport’

Shame of Ipswich

Wednesday, September 26th, 2012

A police motorcade led by outrider bikes and flashing lights sweeps into the East Anglian town of Ipswich destined for the docks. The whirr of a police helicopter accompanies the small crowd gathered hastily to meet the procession. It’s a blustery September evening and the excitement is fuelled by the scramble of media cameras desperate for a picture. But this is no celebrity exit from the country. Interspersed between police vehicles are six livestock transporters carrying sheep destined for slaughter on the continent. It’s the latest move in a game of cat and mouse stretching nearly twenty years; between live animal exporters and the protests that follow them.

Banner-waving protestors yell into the night as the four-tier juggernauts disappear into the gloom. A former Soviet tank carrier awaits by the dockside for its cargo. It’s Friday 21st September. Our team, led by James West, is with local people indignant at the invasion of this town by the trade. This is the first shipment of live animals for slaughter out of Britain since the exporters were summarily thrown out of their last port following an incident involving two arrests and the deaths of over forty sheep.

Many people have spent much energy trying to stop animals being transported on horrifically long journeys simply to be slaughtered at journey’s end. I am proud to have been one of them. Today, the trade is but a stubborn rump of what it used to be; twenty years ago, two and half million animals were shipped out of Britain each year. Now it’s less than a hundred thousand. It’s a trade with a profile and a reputation to match.

With it pinned down to just one port, Ipswich; owned and operated by ABP, I ask for your help in ramping up the pressure to drive the trade in live exports out of its latest bolt hole. Together, we can finish off this deeply unnecessary trade once and for all. Take action today. As ever, thank you so much.

Tags: live exports, transport. Posted in General | 5 Comments »

Turkey live exports

Monday, October 24th, 2011

I defy anyone to watch the latest undercover exposé from Turkey of the transport and slaughter of sheep and cattle and not feel sickened and angry.

Here’s yet more gruesome footage in which unforgivable and inexcusable things are done to farmed animals when they are at their most vulnerable. Please understand that it’s as difficult for me and everyone at Compassion to watch this footage as I am sure it is for you. But please don’t turn away. We owe it to the animals to know how they’re abused in order to speak out on their behalf with authority.

As we saw repeatedly from previous undercover investigations in, for example, Egypt in 2009 and Indonesia this year, sheep, cattle and pigs are repeatedly abused in contravention of the international recommendations of the World Organisation for Animal Health on welfare at slaughter.

We cannot allow these situations to continue. Developments in Turkey are particularly distressing. In the first half of this year almost 600,000 sheep were transported to Turkey from the EU. This is more than twice as many as in the whole of 2010. At least 100,000 cattle were exported from the EU to Turkey in the first half of 2011. This is nearly twice as many as in the whole of 2010. On current trends, we could see more than 1 million animals travel the route this year.

The European Commission has several times been given detailed information about the welfare abuses involved in live exports to Turkey. We have told them how EU law designed to protect animals is regularly broken during these journeys and how protracted delays at the border – lasting hours, sometimes days – intensifies the suffering. Despite this the Commission has failed to take any effective action. If you want to write to the Commission please join us in taking action here.

All of this underscores the importance of keeping up the pressure against the long distance transport trade in animals internationally. Thank you for your continued support.

Tags: Egypt, Indonesia, live exports, long distance transport, slaughter, transport, Turkey, welfare at slaughter. Posted in General | 2 Comments »

Ramsgate: Ban live exports

Monday, June 20th, 2011

A packed public meeting on a rainy Friday evening in Ramsgate; no-one could have any doubt at the strength of feeling against the live animal export trade now going through the town’s port.

The meeting was opened by an impassioned speech from local councillor, Ian Driver, who took the initiative and called this meeting. Local people mingled with stalwart campaigners; veterans of past battles against live exports in Shoreham and Brightlingsea. The RSPCA were joined on the platform by, amongst others, leading members of the dedicated team from Kent Against Live Exports (KALE). It was a privilege to be part of the meeting; and to see so many people speaking out against a trade in live animals that is outdated, unnecessary and causes so much suffering to animals.

Before the meeting, I spoke to Meridian TV News; they had been busy getting sound-bites from local people in Ramsgate about live exports. They told me that finding someone in favour of it had been difficult; testimony to the overwhelming opinion against the trade locally.

Like so many of us, the campaign against long distance animal transport has been part of my life for decades. It’s a chapter I would rather see closed. It was one of the major issues that motivated Compassion’s founder, Peter Roberts. The campaign has brought together people from all walks of life. Together, we’ve had huge impact; at its height in the early-1990s, two million sheep and 500,000 calves were being exported live from Britain to continental Europe; staggering numbers. Last year, that figure was down to 4,000 sheep; the calf trade ceased all together.

What is deeply concerning is that Ramsgate is now hosting a resurgence of the live export trade; a trade that is both inhumane and unnecessary. Only this month, 2 consignments of British calves went from Ramsgate. These calves will often be reared in veal systems that would be illegal in the UK. There is also a major calf trade from Northern Ireland with 7,000 animals this year having gone to Spain and Hungary.

Many of the sheep will be going for slaughter. It simply cannot be right to transport animals over long distances simply to be slaughtered at the journey’s end. This problem is not confined to British live exports. Our recent investigation in Europe pointed to the kind of conditions these animals are often forced to endure; transported in overcrowded and filthy conditions, legs sticking out of the lorries and journeys lasting up to 23 hours long.

You can help. If you haven’t already, please sign the 8-hours petition. Please write urgently to your MEPs calling for European action to end the long distance transport trade and impose a total maximum journey time of 8 hours for animals travelling for slaughter or fattening. It is great to see that Peter Skinner MEP is supporting the campaign. If you live in the Ramsgate area, please write to your local councillors and MPs calling for urgent action. We are putting together an action pack to help you do just that. I will post it very soon. Thank you for helping make live animal exports a thing of the past.

Tags: compassion, slaughter, transport. Posted in General, International | 8 Comments »

A dream comes true

Tuesday, December 1st, 2009

A cause for celebration is that animals in the European Union (EU) are legally recognised as sentient beings; they have legal status as being capable of feeling pain, suffering and, if we give them the chance, a sense of well-being. It was the outcome of a campaign that started in the 1980s in reaction to animals being classified as mere ‘agricultural products’, the psychological and legal pretext that arguably enabled the rise of the long distance transport trade in live animals for slaughter.

The original agreement to give legal status to animals as sentient beings was made in Amsterdam in 1997. Many of us will remember the summer’s day when we marched through the streets of that fine city, demanding that the Treaty of Rome be changed to take a more favourable view of animals. The ‘Amsterdam Protocol’, as it became known, was annexed, or loosely attached, to the founding treaty of the European Community.

Now we have renewed cause for celebration. The entry into force of The Lisbon Treaty in the EU sees this recognition enshrined in a dedicated ‘Article’, a core text of the Treaty. This will give it greater weight in the eyes of decision-makers. We can rejoice at the status of animals having advanced further in Europe.

For the record, the Article states that “In formulating and implementing the Union’s agriculture, fisheries, transport, internal market, research and technological development and space policies, the Union and the Member States shall, since animals are sentient beings, pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals, while respecting the legislative or administrative provisions and customs of the Member States relating in particular to religious rites, cultural traditions and regional heritage.”

Legal recognition of animals as sentient beings does not, of itself, end the practices that we seek to reform; practices such as taking animals on long, unnecessary journeys to slaughter or treating them simply as units of production on our factory farms. However, it does strengthen our argument and gives us a significant lift in shaping decisions that will influence the lives of hundreds of millions of farm animals.

I remember how our late founder dreamed of changing the EU’s underpinning Treaty to better address the status of animals. I remember how that goal was seen as impossible, impractical, by some, even laughable. Now that dream has come true. Now to make that other dream come true; an end to factory farming itself and its terrible travelling companion, the long distance transport of animals.

Tags: EU, factory farming, Lisbon Treaty, transport. Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

Greece guilty!

Wednesday, September 30th, 2009

A recent case in the European Court of Justice (ECJ) demonstrates the power our undercover investigations have in not only exposing animal suffering but also bringing governments to account. The Government of Greece was found guilty for failing to uphold European rules protecting animals during transport and slaughter.

The case was brought by the European Commission following successive exposés by Compassion and other animal welfare groups. Whilst the legislation itself is inadequate, Case 416/07 did strike a blow for proper enforcement of existing rules, something that would prevent much suffering amongst the six million farm animals transported across Europe every year.

Case C-416/07 found Greece guilty of “failing to take all the measures necessary” to properly enforce EU legislation on the protection of animals during transport and slaughter. Specifically, Greece did not

• Ensure competent authorities properly carried out obligatory checks of route plans
• Provide facilities at ferry ports for animals to rest after unloading
• Ensure inspections of animal transport vehicles were completed
• Enforce rules on stunning of animals at slaughter
• Ensure that inspections and controls in slaughterhouses are carried appropriately.

Our investigators, often working undercover at personal risk, gathered evidence in Europe which documented how animals travel enormous distances for considerable time without periods of rest and access to water to reach their final destination – slaughterhouses where they are killed in cruel and unacceptable circumstances.

For example, our latest investigation showed how many unwanted male dairy calves born in Poland and Lithuania have been transported long distances to intensive veal farms in The Netherlands and Italy.
With respect to Case C-416/07, evidence was gathered by the European Commission’s Food and Veterinary Office which investigated how Greece transported and slaughtered farmed animals. The FVO is responsible for checking that Member States are enforcing EU animal welfare legislation properly. Their investigations were prompted in part by our own and those of other like-minded organisations. Our research in Greece in 1997, 2001 and 2005 documented widespread failure to comply with the transportation and slaughter directives.

The ruling in Case C-416/07 shines the spotlight on Greece and its treatment of farmed animals. Greece must now prove to the Commission its compliance with the transportation and slaughter directives. If it does not taken sufficient action, the Commission could issue a “reasoned opinion specifying the points on which Greece has not complied with the judgment.” The case could then be brought back to the ECJ.

Everyone who supports Compassion played a role in the successful prosecution of Greece. Your support helped us to make sure we had sufficient resources to operate our investigators in Europe, including those who work undercover. They provided us with the evidence we used in our reports on countries failing to implement the transportation and slaughter directives. As in Greece’s prosecution, our reports helped to persuade the European Court of Justice and the Food and Veterinary Office that not all of the EU’s member states were in compliance.

Please help us to hold these authorities to account and make sure that EU regulations are enforced by Greece and every other European country.

Thank you!

Tags: EU, Greece, slaughter, transport. Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Saving calves together

Wednesday, September 9th, 2009

I remember the days when we stood at the docks and outside airports across the land to stop live calf exports. I recall that feeling of people from all walks of life joining together in common cause. That was nearly fifteen years ago. Today, I had that same feeling. Today, I have just returned from the Beyond Calf Exports stakeholder meeting in London. A meeting that brought together key representatives from a wide range of supermarkets and other food and farming companies as well as academics and animal welfarists.

And what was so special about today’s meeting was the strength of positive action being taken around the table to implement what has been described in the media as an all-industry voluntary agreement to end calf exports. Our collective aim is to ensure that increasing numbers of calves are given a decent life without being exported to intensive veal units abroad in a way that brings mutual benefits to all in the stakeholder chain.
On today’s showing, whilst we still have a way to go, together we are making real progress and bringing a real difference to the lives of tens of thousands of calves.

In the coming weeks, the Forum will launch its 18-month progress report. I’ll keep you posted.

Tags: calf forum, calves, transport. Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »