In its review of slaughter regulations, the Animal Welfare Committee (AWC) which advises the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, has recommended looking again at introducing labelling on meat products that have been slaughtered without pre-stunning. Humanists UK has long campaigned for the legal loopholes which permit non-stun slaughter to be closed, and short of that, for the introduction of labelling to let consumers make informed choices.
While acknowledging that ‘religious slaughter is a sensitive issue so will need careful handling’, the Committee recommended ‘tightening the intention that meat from non-stun religious slaughter be destined for religious markets and not the general consumer, which might also bring in labelling and supply and demand requirements for meat from non-stun slaughter.’
Currently, all food animals must be stunned before slaughter to minimise the animal’s suffering. However, there are religious exemptions for Jews and Muslims to slaughter animals while still fully conscious to produce halal and kosher compliant meat. But despite the regulations being clear that such practices can only be carried out by accredited Jewish and Muslim slaughterers and consumed only by Jews and Muslims, such meat is frequently entering the general market and that there is no effective way to regulate this, such as a clear system of labelling that denotes the method of slaughter used.
Humanists UK’s Director of Public Affairs and Policy Richy Thompson commented,
‘We welcome this recommendation from the AWC for the Government to look into ways of ensuring that non-stunned meat does not enter the general meat market, including looking at introducing labelling. Such calls have been made by all the major animal welfare organisations across the UK for many years now. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) and the Humane Slaughter Association support not only introducing labelling as an interim measure but removing the legal loopholes that allow the non-stunned slaughter to take place at all. The British Veterinary Association also supports labelling.
‘It is time that the Government listened to animal welfare experts, including those within its own Committee, and put the welfare of the animals at the heart of its policies on farming.’
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For further comment or information, please contact Humanists UK Director of Public Affairs and Policy Richy Thompson at press@humanists.uk or phone 020 7324 3072 or 020 3675 0959.
Read the Animal Welfare Committee’s report.
Read more about our work on animal welfare.
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