You may remember froma previous Blog post that I oppose the badger cull. One of my observations mentioned that farmers are supposedly upset when their infected cattle are culled in spite of being compensated generously by the government for their "loss". I pointed out that this was massively hypocritical because farmers. including dairy farmers, are in the business of slaughter and it was hard to believe that they would be sad when a cow was slaughtered because it had Bovine TB when it was going to be slaughtered sooner or later anyway. I thought you might be interested this which I have taken from the Daily Mail Newspaper today. It speaks volumes in support of my argument.
"ANIMAL rights campaigners have claimed dairy calves only days old are being shot to feed hunt hounds.
Undercover footage by campaigners shows a young male being shot in the head as it stands on a pile of calf carcasses in a trailer.
The farm in Bristol shown in the film supplies milk to Cadbury, which makes 250million bars of chocolate each year.
Male calves are virtually useless to farmers as they do not provide milk and there is little demand to buy them.
Campaigners claim the calf is one of around 100,000 male dairy animals executed shortly after birth each year as there is no market for them.
The undercover film-makers from Viva! claim the calf was shot by a member of Beaufort Hunt. This was regularly attended by members of the Royal Family including Prince Charles and his sons William and Harry before the 2004 foxhunting ban.
The calf’s corpse was later taken away to be fed to the hounds. The footage was secretly recorded by animal welfare activists who infiltrated a number of farms which supply milk to the confectionary industry.
Despite the distressing images, none of the actions seen in the film are illegal.
Dairy cows must be impregnated yearly to produce milk for human consumption but many of the male calves born are deemed surplus as demand for veal is limited.
They are shot soon after birth and turned into pet food or other low-value products. Speaking after the footage was released, Viva! campaigner Kat Affleck said: ‘Consumers have a right to know the brutal truth that Cadbury’s would rather keep quiet, how dairy products are produced.
‘The cruel parental separation and shooting of thousands of male dairy calves hardly fits in with their picturesque pastoral image.
‘One hundred thousand shots ring out on dairy farms every year because of unwanted males. Sadly virtu-
‘We do not enjoy it’
ally all milk, has similar provenance . The cruelty is inherent to the industry.’
Ian Farquhar, joint master of the Beaufort Hunt, last night said the hunt was ‘helping out the farming community’ to deal with unwanted calves.
He said: ‘It is not a question of being cruel. I was a farmer when calves were raised and put into the food chain. But through EU legislation and DEFRA policy, there is no longer a market for them.
‘It has nothing to do with the hunts. It is simply non-viable for the farmers to raise calves. ‘The hunts who still collect calves are doing it purely for the benefit of the farmer. We do not enjoy it, it is simply a case of the rural community helping each other out.’
A spokesman for Kraft, Cadbury’s parent company, said the firm took animal welfare ‘very seriously’ and said it was an out-of-the-ordinary incident.
The spokesman said this particular calf had a deformed leg. He was taken from the farm by a licensed slaughterer from the Beaufort Hunt Kennels and dealt with humanely. He said: ‘We purchase milk from hundreds of farms across the UK. This video is 18 months old and, at the time it was released, we said we took animal welfare very seriously and nothing has changed.’
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