Those of us concerned about the treatment of caged hens have always argued against the appalling battery cages on the basis that they prevent the hens from expressing the vast majority of their natural, instinctive behaviours. They cannot spread, let alone flap, their wings; they cannot dust-bathe; there is no nest, no roosting and no perch. As they cannot exercise, their bones are weakened and break easily. They cannot even preen themselves.
Absolutely nothing in the ACT Government's new regulations ("Improving the welfare of caged hens”, 23 Feb 2010, http://www.chiefminister.act.gov.au/media.php?v=9255&m=51) will alleviate a single one of those restrictions.
And for the Chief Minister to brag about the extra space for ACT hens is nauseating. The only reason that the Parkwood hens have a little more space (a scant finger width in all directions) than most caged hens in Australia is that Pace Farm chose not to replace their obsolete, filthy bloody cages when regulations changed two years ago. Instead, they simply restocked with one less bird per cage.
And despite Stanhope's ridiculous claim, it is just not possible to "improve the welfare" of hens while keeping them in battery cages.
The ACT must truly take the lead and ban the cages.
Showing posts with label pace farm. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pace farm. Show all posts
Friday, February 26, 2010
Friday, January 22, 2010
An open letter to RSPCA ACT CEO, Michael Linke
Michael, I have seen your recent messages to one of the Animal Liberation ACT members following some posts (since deleted) on the RSPCA ACT Facebook page. I am not writing on behalf of AL-ACT as I am not an office bearer – just an ordinary member. But as such I took offence at your words and wanted to pass on my thoughts to you – and your members.
The origin of the discussion was an announcement by RSPCA of upcoming events. This brought about a number of posts suggesting that the RSPCA should serve only vegan food at such events as the production of unnecessary animal based foods causes massive suffering and the deaths of millions of farmed animals. It was put that by so doing, the RSPCA would be taking a very clear stance against the treatment of farmed animals – removing some of the inconsistency in its current position.
In response, you stated that “we do not promote a vegetarian lifestyle”. We know that – but we fail to see why. Your UK RSPCA colleagues provide links to the Vegetarian Society, have recently encouraged people to “look out for a tasty vegetarian alternative, such as a nut roast” for Christmas dinner and have educational materials that encourage teachers and students to look at the issue.
The RSPCA ACT website does not even mention the word ‘vegetarian’ yet reducing the amount of animal products one consumes is the single most effective way to reduce animal suffering.
You also labelled us ‘extremists’ and accused us of “bemoaning” and criticising rather than taking real action. I find that extremely offensive and arrogant given that you are a paid, full-time CEO of a multi-million dollar organisation. To criticise the amount of work done by volunteers in a small community group is a bit rich – and is also completely unjustified. AL-ACT is extremely active and has achieved much on a very limited budget. They have been instrumental in having animal circuses and rodeos banned and despite your apparent attempt to claim personal credit for the ban on fireworks and the new egg-labelling laws, AL-ACT has been extremely active and effective in both those campaigns for years.
Further to the battery caged eggs issue, I attended your launch of the Choose Wisely campaign at the parliament house breakfast and, as I said to you afterwards, I was very disappointed that you could not even mention the work done by Animal Liberation in the speeches and video presentation purporting to portray the history of the anti-cage campaigns in the ACT. You made no mention at all of the work done over the last 14 years by AL – including its work with the Greens on drafting Bills and the effective campaigning carried out by Free Range Canberra (an AL-ACT campaign).
The RSPCA often demonstrates a blind spot for farmed animals continuing with a recent item in the Canberra Times regarding the hot weather where you appealed for people to take care of domestic animals and expressed concern for wildlife yet failed to mention the thousands of sheep and cattle often left in paddocks with no shade on the hottest of days. Nor did you mention your commercial partners, Pace Farm and how the hens in their stinking hot sheds at Parkwood would have suffered over these hot periods.
We know you are not an animal rights group but you don’t need to be to mention on your site and in your literature that no modern animal ‘farming’ is humane.
I understand the difference between animal rights and animal welfare. I can see that taking a position (veganism/animal rights) at the end of the spectrum causes difficulties in pulling the average Aussie that long distance from his current meat-eating way of life. I can also see your point in aiming for prodding Mr Average via small steps and staying “in the tent” – but while you are there you need to start acknowledging that there is a lot of space and a growing crowd outside it.
RSPCA is far too inclined to stay in its comfort zone. It’s time you all got a bit bolder and acknowledged veganism as the most effective way for individuals to reduce animal suffering. And refusing to serve dead animals at your functions should be your first step.
Mike O'Shaughnessy
The origin of the discussion was an announcement by RSPCA of upcoming events. This brought about a number of posts suggesting that the RSPCA should serve only vegan food at such events as the production of unnecessary animal based foods causes massive suffering and the deaths of millions of farmed animals. It was put that by so doing, the RSPCA would be taking a very clear stance against the treatment of farmed animals – removing some of the inconsistency in its current position.
In response, you stated that “we do not promote a vegetarian lifestyle”. We know that – but we fail to see why. Your UK RSPCA colleagues provide links to the Vegetarian Society, have recently encouraged people to “look out for a tasty vegetarian alternative, such as a nut roast” for Christmas dinner and have educational materials that encourage teachers and students to look at the issue.
The RSPCA ACT website does not even mention the word ‘vegetarian’ yet reducing the amount of animal products one consumes is the single most effective way to reduce animal suffering.
You also labelled us ‘extremists’ and accused us of “bemoaning” and criticising rather than taking real action. I find that extremely offensive and arrogant given that you are a paid, full-time CEO of a multi-million dollar organisation. To criticise the amount of work done by volunteers in a small community group is a bit rich – and is also completely unjustified. AL-ACT is extremely active and has achieved much on a very limited budget. They have been instrumental in having animal circuses and rodeos banned and despite your apparent attempt to claim personal credit for the ban on fireworks and the new egg-labelling laws, AL-ACT has been extremely active and effective in both those campaigns for years.
Further to the battery caged eggs issue, I attended your launch of the Choose Wisely campaign at the parliament house breakfast and, as I said to you afterwards, I was very disappointed that you could not even mention the work done by Animal Liberation in the speeches and video presentation purporting to portray the history of the anti-cage campaigns in the ACT. You made no mention at all of the work done over the last 14 years by AL – including its work with the Greens on drafting Bills and the effective campaigning carried out by Free Range Canberra (an AL-ACT campaign).
The RSPCA often demonstrates a blind spot for farmed animals continuing with a recent item in the Canberra Times regarding the hot weather where you appealed for people to take care of domestic animals and expressed concern for wildlife yet failed to mention the thousands of sheep and cattle often left in paddocks with no shade on the hottest of days. Nor did you mention your commercial partners, Pace Farm and how the hens in their stinking hot sheds at Parkwood would have suffered over these hot periods.
We know you are not an animal rights group but you don’t need to be to mention on your site and in your literature that no modern animal ‘farming’ is humane.
I understand the difference between animal rights and animal welfare. I can see that taking a position (veganism/animal rights) at the end of the spectrum causes difficulties in pulling the average Aussie that long distance from his current meat-eating way of life. I can also see your point in aiming for prodding Mr Average via small steps and staying “in the tent” – but while you are there you need to start acknowledging that there is a lot of space and a growing crowd outside it.
RSPCA is far too inclined to stay in its comfort zone. It’s time you all got a bit bolder and acknowledged veganism as the most effective way for individuals to reduce animal suffering. And refusing to serve dead animals at your functions should be your first step.
Mike O'Shaughnessy
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
A Ban on Battery Cages in the ACT
A ban on the use of battery cages for egg production in the ACT is well overdue and is now very achievable.
* It would affect one facility only – Pace Farm, Parkwood.
* The ACT Greens’ now hold the balance of power in the Assembly and their Animal Welfare policy states that they support “legislating to phase out battery egg production in the ACT by 2012” - a commitment not only to the ban but also to an achievable time-frame – one that aligns with the coming EU ban.
* The ACT Legislative Assembly has favoured a ban for over ten years.
- A ban was passed by the Legislative Assembly in 1997. In 1997 the Animal Welfare Amendment Act 1996 was passed which resulted in this clause being inserted in the ACT Animal Welfare Act 1992,
9A Battery hens
A person commits an offence if—
(a) the person keeps hens for egg production; and
(b) the hens are kept in a battery cage system.
Maximum penalty: 100 penalty units, imprisonment for 1 year or both.
However, this clause is still uncommenced due to its commencement being tied to a ban on the sale of cage eggs in the ACT which required an exemption under the Mutual Recognition Act.
- Ten years later, during the debate on The Greens’ Animal Welfare Amendment Bill 2007 both major parties expressed their opposition to battery cages.
LABOR: A Government media release of 25 Sep 2007 announced three measures “designed to phase out battery egg production in the ACT”. The three measures announced by the Chief Minister were:
- An offer of assistance to Pace Farm to convert their Parkwood facility to barn or free-range
- Aproaching other governments in an attempt to achieve a national approach to the issue
- Implementing a purchasing policy in all ACT Government institutions which prohibits cage-eggs
* Pace Farm is not an important industry to the ACT.He went on to say that if measures 1 and 2 failed he was prepared to revisit a ban: “Mr Stanhope said if the offer of industry assistance was not accepted after negotiation with Pace and if advocacy at the national level proved fruitless the Government was prepared to revisit the issue of battery egg production in the future”.
The Chief Minister has admitted that his advocacy at the national level has failed. Pace has not accepted the offer to convert – eighteen months after it was made. They do not see a market for barn eggs and the location is not suitable for free-range hens.
LIBERAL:
Then the Liberals announced in the Assembly on 26 Sep 2007: “The Canberra Liberals support the banning of cage egg production not just in the ACT, as is the proposition of the Greens, but also nationally".
- Pace has very few employees (only 14, according to their details as given to the National Pollutant Inventory).
- The company pays a trivial rent of $486 per annum for the Parkwood site.
* Pace Farm is not a good neighbour for the ACT.
- Pace has breached the code of practice by leaving hens to slowly die in the manure pits. Particularly during de-stocking – every 15-16months or so –hens can fall into the manure pits below the cages. The Code of Practice for the Welfare of Animals, Domestic Poultry, 4th Edition states in part:
11.3 … In the case of poultry in cages the daily inspection must
specifically include checking for entrapment and checking of the manure areas under cages for escaped birds. …
12.7 Where birds are found to have escaped into the manure area under cages they must be captured as soon as practicable on
the day of observation and returned to cages or destroyed humanely.
In 2008, a day after a de-stocking event, 70-80 hens were rescued from the manure pits. After a previous de-stocking event, many of the hens rescued had rock-hard, tennis ball sized accumulations of manure on their legs – evidence that they had been in the pits for far longer than 1 or 2 days.
- The Macgregor West residential development is right next to the Pace Farm facility. Macgregor West is located less than 1 km east of the battery hen sheds and the occasional huge piles of manure. With houses so close this is another good reason to close down the facility. A hot westerly wind will not smell like roses to residents of the new development.
- A local survey commissioned in September 2005 regarding the ACT community’s views on battery caged hens found 73% of respondents supported banning the cages.
- A WIN TV News poll resulted in an overwhelming 94% support for a ban.
- Some jurisdictions have moved to ban the cages.
- An EU-wide ban on the use of conventional battery cages for egg laying hens will be applied from 1 January 2012
- The US state of California voted last year to ban the cages.
- Many retailers, campuses and other organisations have announced that they will no longer purchase cage eggs.
- From http://www.farminguk.com/news/Sainsburys-make-decision-to-sell-only-free-range-eggs-from-5th-February10251.asp: "UK retailer, Sainsbury’s announced that from 5th February 2009 it will no longer sell eggs from battery hens. Sainsbury’s is the first major retailer to make such a pledge ensuring over half a million hens will no longer be kept in battery cages".
- Over 150 US university campuses – including Harvard, Princeton and Tufts – have made the decision not to support the cruelty of battery hen farming. In Australia the University of Newcastlehas decided to have all food outlets use cage-free eggs.
- Three Tasmanian local councils (Hobart, Clarence and Launceston) have announced that they will only use eggs from free range farms at council functions and our own ACT Government institutions will not purchase any more cage eggs after May 2009.
- McDonalds UK serves only free-range eggs now.
- In Britain, the Guardianreports that the majority of eggs purchased in
March 2008 were from free-range hens.
- In Australia, the proportion eggs sold which came from cages is decreasing.
The Australian Egg Corporation Annual Reports show that the market share of free-range eggs in Australia rose from 20.3% to 23.4% in the 12 months to June 2007 while the sale of cage eggs dropped from 74.9% to 71.4% in the same period.* The ban would be an effective, important step for animal welfare.
The Chief Minister argues that an ACT ban would be ineffective as Pace would simply move the cages interstate.Let’s finally do it!
In his Media Release, “Momentum for battery egg phase out”, of 16 Apr 2008, Chief Minister Jon Stanhope said, “While there have been calls for the ACT Government to simply ban the use of battery cages in the ACT, this would not save a single hen from the fate of life in a battery cage, as the battery cage would just move across the border where the use of battery cage use was still legal”.
I disagree. Given the strong move away from cage egg consumption, egg producers such as Pace Farm are unlikely to invest in new cage facilities. They can see the writing on the wall.
However, even if the cages were relocated, an ACT ban would send a clear message to the industry, consumers and other States.
It would be a very important, symbolic step.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Animal Liberation and the RSPCA
The President of Animal Liberation ACT (AL ACT), Mary Hayes, and I were invited to this morning’s Parliament House breakfast launch of Choose Wisely – the new RSPCA initiative designed to reduce the number of cage eggs consumed in Australia. I got a guernsey due to my previous involvement with AL ACT and its Free Range Canberra (FRC) campaign.
The morning started badly – no soy milk for this vegan’s coffee (“we do have skim milk, Sir”). Then it got worse; in announcing the launch of Choose Wisely, RSPCA ACT CEO, Michael Linke, acknowledged the past work of others in seeking to have cages banned in the ACT including the Greens MLA Dr Deb Foskey but, sadly, neglected to acknowledge the ongoing work of AL ACT. He made no mention of AL ACT’s role in the 1997 attempt to legislate against the cages and its more recent “Free Range Canberra” campaign which led to the introduction of last year’s revised Bill by the Greens. Ah well.
“Choose Wisely” is a term that has been used for some time by the RSPCA but now has a new logo and its own website http://www.choosewisely.org.au/. It is intended to persuade organisations to move toward the use of cage-free eggs. Those that do will earn the right to display Gold, Silver or Bronze logos depending on their degree of progress in eliminating cage eggs from their businesses. InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) was announced as the first ACT business to commit to the move toward cage-free eggs as part of the RSPCA campaign.
The campaign will also encourage consumers to support such businesses and to use RSPCA supplied calling cards at other eateries – leaving them on the table to encourage the café to change its buying habits.
The IHG move will mean some 200,000 eggs per year in the ACT will be RSPCA–accredited cage-free eggs instead of sourced from caged birds. But will that make a difference? The Pace Farm facility in the ACT produces some 60 million eggs per year so even if IHG have been using all ACT eggs up til now the change will only affect about 0.33% of the ACT facility’s output.
This move is more symbolic than practical so it will really only make a difference if it leads other businesses and individuals to change their buying habits. Let’s hope that RSPCA and IHG can get some media coverage.
The Animal Liberation movement and the RSPCA have had their differences – and they continue to do so. According to http://www.rspcawatchdog.org/ (the Animal Lib point of view), “Despite the hard work of volunteers, RSPCA management consistently fails animals.” The RSPCA South Australia site (http://blog1.rspcasa.asn.au/2007/01/12/animal-liberation-front/) gives the other perspective. It says “we fundamentally differ from the animal liberation movement in the methods we use”.
But the differences are not restricted to methodology – the RSPCA also differs from the AL movement in what it regards as cruel. At breakfast this morning after seeing a DVD showing the horrors of battery cages we were invited to enjoy our hot breakfast which included cage-free eggs, bacon and chicken sausages – proclaimed joyously as all ‘cruelty-free’. This is where we differ. The RSPCA believes that it’s ok for humans to use animals – to breed them, incarcerate them, separate mothers from their babies, perform surgical procedures on them, transport them and, of course, slaughter them – as long as it’s all done ‘humanely’.
Does this mean that Animal Liberation and the RSPCA can’t work together? I don’t think so. As an Animal Liberationist I see the RSPCA as on the right track – but just a bit further back. Still, by being more conservative than Liberationists they are more likely to gain support from the general public as well as from politicians and businesses.
The local RSPCA ACT folk have been supportive on the battery cage issue – even if a little ignorant of AL ACT’s efforts and achievements – and I think this initiative deserves AL’s support. They are a far bigger organisation with a lot more money to spend than most Australian AL groups. Besides, once they achieve this goal of finishing off battery cages they will most likely have come to see the cruelty inherent in the barn system and refocus on it.
The morning started badly – no soy milk for this vegan’s coffee (“we do have skim milk, Sir”). Then it got worse; in announcing the launch of Choose Wisely, RSPCA ACT CEO, Michael Linke, acknowledged the past work of others in seeking to have cages banned in the ACT including the Greens MLA Dr Deb Foskey but, sadly, neglected to acknowledge the ongoing work of AL ACT. He made no mention of AL ACT’s role in the 1997 attempt to legislate against the cages and its more recent “Free Range Canberra” campaign which led to the introduction of last year’s revised Bill by the Greens. Ah well.
“Choose Wisely” is a term that has been used for some time by the RSPCA but now has a new logo and its own website http://www.choosewisely.org.au/. It is intended to persuade organisations to move toward the use of cage-free eggs. Those that do will earn the right to display Gold, Silver or Bronze logos depending on their degree of progress in eliminating cage eggs from their businesses. InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) was announced as the first ACT business to commit to the move toward cage-free eggs as part of the RSPCA campaign.
The campaign will also encourage consumers to support such businesses and to use RSPCA supplied calling cards at other eateries – leaving them on the table to encourage the café to change its buying habits.
The IHG move will mean some 200,000 eggs per year in the ACT will be RSPCA–accredited cage-free eggs instead of sourced from caged birds. But will that make a difference? The Pace Farm facility in the ACT produces some 60 million eggs per year so even if IHG have been using all ACT eggs up til now the change will only affect about 0.33% of the ACT facility’s output.
This move is more symbolic than practical so it will really only make a difference if it leads other businesses and individuals to change their buying habits. Let’s hope that RSPCA and IHG can get some media coverage.
The Animal Liberation movement and the RSPCA have had their differences – and they continue to do so. According to http://www.rspcawatchdog.org/ (the Animal Lib point of view), “Despite the hard work of volunteers, RSPCA management consistently fails animals.” The RSPCA South Australia site (http://blog1.rspcasa.asn.au/2007/01/12/animal-liberation-front/) gives the other perspective. It says “we fundamentally differ from the animal liberation movement in the methods we use”.
But the differences are not restricted to methodology – the RSPCA also differs from the AL movement in what it regards as cruel. At breakfast this morning after seeing a DVD showing the horrors of battery cages we were invited to enjoy our hot breakfast which included cage-free eggs, bacon and chicken sausages – proclaimed joyously as all ‘cruelty-free’. This is where we differ. The RSPCA believes that it’s ok for humans to use animals – to breed them, incarcerate them, separate mothers from their babies, perform surgical procedures on them, transport them and, of course, slaughter them – as long as it’s all done ‘humanely’.
Does this mean that Animal Liberation and the RSPCA can’t work together? I don’t think so. As an Animal Liberationist I see the RSPCA as on the right track – but just a bit further back. Still, by being more conservative than Liberationists they are more likely to gain support from the general public as well as from politicians and businesses.
The local RSPCA ACT folk have been supportive on the battery cage issue – even if a little ignorant of AL ACT’s efforts and achievements – and I think this initiative deserves AL’s support. They are a far bigger organisation with a lot more money to spend than most Australian AL groups. Besides, once they achieve this goal of finishing off battery cages they will most likely have come to see the cruelty inherent in the barn system and refocus on it.
By the way, had the RSPCA been more aware of AL’s Free Range Canberra campaign they’d have seen that FRC recruited businesses long ago to commit to free range eggs (http://www.freerangecanberra.org/restcafe.htm).
They would also have been familiar with this calling card.
On a final note, after breakfast we were treated to a speech supporting the new campaign by Senator Gary Humphries who has apparently changed his spots somewhat since his days in the ACT Legislative Assembly where in 1997 he opposed the Greens’ Bill to ban battery cages on the basis of the possible loss of the Parkwood facility and its jobs from the ACT as well as “the weaknesses that the alternative schemes of egg production being suggested by the Greens might have in terms of animal welfare”. Good to see you catching up, Senator.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Filthy Battery Cages in the A.C.T.
You may have seen Jamie Oliver’s recent TV show on eggs and chicken meat. If so, you’d have seen him stroll through a huge, modern looking battery egg production shed. We saw the shiny, clean metal of the cages and heard him say that there was no strong smell. As bad as these shiny cramped cages are for the hens, many older battery cage facilities, including the Pace Farm Canberra sheds at Parkwood (Macgregor West) are far worse.
They are filthy, stinking hell-holes full of manure, cobwebs, mice and rats and have a stench of ammonia and manure that can knock you over.
I’ve been to the Parkwood sheds twice.
Each visit coincided with Pace Farm de-populating (emptying) one or two of their sheds. They do this after about 12 to 15 months when it is determined that the
hens have passed their peak production.It’s not a matter of monitoring each hen and retiring her when she's past her prime, they pull all 20,000 to 30,000 hens out of the shed on the designated date.
These so-called ‘spent hens’ are yanked out of the cages which they have shared with one or two others for over a year and passed by their legs down a bucket-line of casual workers then crammed into crates to be taken by truck to be slaughtered for second quality meat products including pet food and stock feed (for example, see
http://www.greatplainsprotein.com/)
In the process, some hens are dropped or escape from their cages. Many of these end up in the manure piled up on the ground level of the sheds below the cages – the accumulated droppings of the thousands of hens over the previous year.
These hens are supposed to be retrieved. The ACT Domestic Poultry Code of Practice section 12.7 states, “Where birds are found to have escaped into the manure area under cages they must be captured as soon as practicable on the day of observation and returned to cages or destroyed humanely”.
But they are not worth a lot to Pace so are left to fend for themselves.
On my first visit, there were many birds in the manure who had obviously been there for some time as they had hard balls of manure built up around their legs making it difficult for them to walk. On the second visit, the manure was wetter and many birds were stuck fast – some drowned or drowning in the more liquid sections of the manure.
The fermenting, stinking manure will be scooped out by a front-end loader in the following days before a fresh load of young hens are crammed into their homes for the next year or so.
The cages shown in Jamie Oliver’s show were bad enough, denying the hens the opportunity to be hens, to spread their wings, dust bathe, nest etc. But the Pace cages in Canberra are even worse.
If you still eat eggs – please make sure you buy free range eggs, preferably from a certified organic supplier.
Better still – give them up. They are not necessary.
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