Farmed Animals: Cages

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Monday 20th June 2022 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. I join Members in congratulating the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers), who introduced the debate in a very measured way. I also thought he was very brave to mentioned Peppa Pig in his introduction. He set the scene very effectively for a debate on what is a large petition, with over 100,000 signatures. I congratulate Compassion in World Farming and others on securing such support. We know that the support is widespread across the country. I very much enjoyed addressing the rally by Compassion in World Farming outside Parliament last week. It demanded that the Government get on with ending the live export of animals. I will return to that issue.

We had a very similar debate on this issue just over two years ago in Westminster Hall. Members might reflect on whether much has changed in that time. I am sure the Minister would be keen to say that much has, but I am not sure that it has. I reflect on the very powerful contribution made by Sir David Amess that day. It was the most powerful contribution in that debate, I think. He made a plea to move things forward.

Members have noted that there have been improvements over the past few decades. We have seen the end of barren battery cages, veal cages for calves and sow stalls for pigs, but we still have a long way to go. Every year, we keep around 16 million farmed animals in cages. There are alternatives. I thought some of the points made by Government Members were very interesting. There is clearly not a settled position on the Government side on trade policy on this issue. There is absolutely no point making improvements here if we just export cruelty elsewhere. There is also no point introducing measures that our industry cannot cope with. That is why we must make changes in a sensible, measured way.

I thought the point made by the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers), was powerful. These are not easy issues. There are easy slogans, but these are hard issues. Those who saw the article in The Times on Saturday will see that the current Secretary of State is perhaps at odds with other members of the Government on this. It is an ongoing discussion. There can be no solution to this problem unless we can work with others.

I will not repeat a lot of the statistics that have been mentioned about egg-laying hens. These points are probably the same ones that I and others made two years ago and which others have made today. It is interesting to see the supermarkets moving in response to consumer demand, but it is not just the retail sector that uses eggs, and not all supermarkets have come to the same conclusion.

When consumers are hard pressed, price does matter. There is no point denying that. There are extra costs, particularly at a time when we are suffering huge problems with avian flu, which has created difficulties for the sector. Earlier this afternoon, I was talking to people in the industry, who warned me that some egg producers are within weeks of having to make some big decisions. That is bad for them, but it is also bad for us, because later in the year there is a risk that we will suddenly not have a regular supply of eggs. These are complicated questions.

[Tracey Crouch]

Does the hon. Member agree that as the UK continues to be gripped by the cost of living crisis, it is really important that retailers—especially ones that pride themselves on offering less expensive food—embrace the drive to be cage-free, so that all consumers can benefit from better welfare standards?

[Daniel Zeichner]

Indeed. That goes to the heart of some of the difficult issues in the supply chains. It is also the case that the Groceries Code Adjudicator has seen more claims in recent times because of the pressure in the supply chain. We can all understand that. It goes back to some fairly basic questions about how we address rising energy prices, but that is a debate for another day. The knock-on effect through sectors like this is very real. I fear that it will be difficult for some in the supply chain. We have problems in the poultry sector, but we have also seen huge problems in the pig sector over the last year or two. The Minister and I have exchanged strong words about this many times at the Dispatch Box.

Leaving aside the issue of the cages, some of the ways in which we have had to cull healthy pigs are not great, nor are some of the conditions that pigs have had to be kept in, as they get too big for the space. There are problems throughout the sectors. We have heard about the problems with cages, and the distress that that can cause by stopping pigs engaging in out their natural behaviours, such as nesting. I have been on pig farms and must say, when I see biting behaviour, it worries me, because they are clearly intelligent animals and, sometimes, they are stressed.

The cages can lead to higher stress levels, longer farrowing durations and higher stillbirth rates. Again, I understand the arguments from the industry about why it thinks it needs those things to prevent the deaths of piglets by accidental crushing. However, I hear what other Members have said, and when I look at the evidence, it seems that there are other ways of doing it in other places, and I think that we must move on to loose-housing systems.

In passing, I would mention the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) and others about the fact that other countries are moving forward on these issues. The EU’s 2027 target may be optimistic, but I think that there is sometimes a danger that Government Members that the world is standing still out there—it is not. The automatic assumption is that we will be in a better place—not necessarily. It would be sensible, I would say, to move at a similar pace, because then some of these problems could be resolved sensibly.

There are also, of course, concerns about calf pens. Although veal crates are banned, young calves can still be kept in solitary caged hutches for the first eight weeks of their lives, as soon as they have been taken away from the mother cow. The logic for that is said to be that young calves are highly susceptible to disease. I was on one of my local farms the other day and witnessed exactly that. However, again, it is pretty clear that cattle are social animals, and there is evidence that calves are more stressed and fearful when caged individually in that way so soon after birth. There is also research that shows that housing calves in pairs leads to a number of positive outcomes without compromising health or production, so there are things that can and should be done.

We have also heard that cages are not only used for animals farmed for food. The issue of the millions of pheasants and partridges that are mass-produced to be shot still raises serious issues and concerns for many of us. Our worry is that they live in so-called raised laying cages that can be left outside, exposed to the elements and to extremes of temperature, with the birds suffering from feather loss, scalping and injuries inflicted by their stressed cage mates.

The regulatory system for that seems not to be up to date. The current code of practice for the welfare of game birds reared for sporting purposes is, I am told, not legally binding, and was due to be reviewed a few years ago, but that did not take place. I am also told that the Minister has indicated, in response to parliamentary questions, that the Government are examining the use of cages for game birds, so I am sure that she will be able to confirm that. As an observation, there seems to be a lot of examining going on in the Department these days; we need action rather than examining. Will the Minister confirm that, as previously stated, DEFRA will be calling for evidence later this year as part of the investigation into the welfare of game birds?

The Opposition watch these developments with some interest. Two years ago, when we were scrutinising through the Agriculture Bill we tabled a number of amendments to increase the maximum stocking density for chickens reared in barns and to end the use of sow-farrowing crates. We did so again in the Committee that scrutinised the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill. Sadly, the Government chose not to support those amendments, but I am rather hoping that, over time, they will come round to our way of thinking. The Kept Animals Bill seems to be a little delayed, I think it is fair to say.

[The Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food (Victoria Prentis)]

indicated dissent.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

The Minister is shaking her head. In that case, I am sure that she can give us a good timetable. That will come as a relief to many of us. It has been carried over; let us hope that we see it soon. As has been said by many others, we need action now to bring an end to the cage age.

It is also vital that we ensure that any domestic production of animal products, produced through higher welfare, cage-free standards, is not simply undercut and replaced by imports from countries that still use lower-welfare cage systems. Any conversation with farmers at the moment leads very quickly to their concerns about being undercut in trade deals. I think we may be discussing this issue again later in the week but, to our eyes, the Government’s long-delayed national food strategy failed to include proper protections for imported food. Henry Dimbleby, the author of the Government inquiry that was set up a few years ago, said:

“Yet again the government has ducked the issue of how we don’t just import food that destroys the environment and is cruel to animals—we can’t create a good fair farming system, then export those harms abroad. I thought the government would address this but it didn’t.”

Well, perhaps the Minister can do so today.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

The hon. Gentleman is making excellent points, which are echoed by the many emails I have had from constituents on this issue. Does he agree that when food is produced much further away from where it is eaten, trying to interrogate animal welfare standards becomes almost impossible for consumers and shops?

[Daniel Zeichner]

The hon. Lady raises a very important question, and one of the challenges of the years and decades ahead will be to try to resolve these conundrums. The Opposition feel strongly that the more we can produce food closer to home, the better off we will be.

Although I appreciate that there are concerns about the impact that increasing animal welfare standards could have on food prices—particularly at the moment, when many households are struggling with sky-high inflation—the fact is that, as set out in Dimbleby’s report, our food system is not working. It fails animals, it fails the environment and often it fails the consumer. In our view, the national food strategy has not addressed those issues. We want to see the Government work with the food sector to ensure that we can improve animal welfare without pushing up the cost for consumers. As I said two years ago, we need rock-solid commitments that ending the use of cages on our farms is a priority for the Government, and we need proper detail on how they plan to do that through a proper farming policy.

The Government have stated on numerous occasions their aspiration for the UK to become the global leader in farm animal welfare, and they really could embrace a cage-free future now. I ask the Minister to explain why this suffering should be allowed to continue, and why the Government have consistently kicked the can down the road when it comes to ending the cage age.