PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Slaughterhouses: Animal Welfare (7 October 2016)
Question Asked
Asked by:
Kerry McCarthy (Labour)
Answer
The new legislation Welfare at Time of Killing implemented in Wales in 2014 and in England in 2015 introduced new welfare reporting requirements. In addition, during 2015/16 the Food Standards Agency (FSA) introduced new animal welfare measures in slaughterhouses which included increased consistency of reporting of transport related breaches. Both these factors are likely to have contributed to the increased instances recorded in the previous two years.
The FSA does not record the numbers of individual animals which died as a result of transportation to slaughterhouses. The FSA records the number of instances that animals were found to be Dead on Arrival (DOA). The number of DOA instances for the last six years are set out in the following table:
2010/11 | 2011/12 | 2012/13 | 2013/14 | 2014/15 | 2015/16 |
144 | 64 | 5 | 16 | 28 | 265 |
The FSA does not record the number of individual animals involved in a welfare breaches in slaughterhouses or during transportation. The FSA records the number of instances of breaches. The number of critical welfare breaches in slaughterhouses and transportation for the last six years are set out in the following tables:
Slaughterhouses
2010/11 | 2011/12 | 2012/13 | 2013/14 | 2014/15 | 2015/16 |
158 | 132 | 65 | 113 | 217 | 234 |
Transportation
2010/11 | 2011/12 | 2012/13 | 2013/14 | 2014/15 | 2015/16 |
394 | 342 | 308 | 535 | 1,488 | 2,097 |
Answered by:
Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford (Conservative)
17 October 2016
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