Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to improve the welfare of livestock undergoing slaughter.

The Government encourages the highest standards of animal welfare at slaughter. A post implementation review of The Welfare of Animals at the Time of Killing (England) Regulations 2015 is underway and should be completed this year

There are long standing animal welfare concerns with high concentration carbon dioxide gas stunning of pigs. We recently commissioned the Animal Welfare Committee to provide an up to date and comprehensive animal welfare assessment of the evidence on high concentration carbon dioxide stunning of pigs and potential alternative stunning methods. We are also tracking the progress of the EU PigStun project, which is seeking to develop non-aversive stunning systems for pigs. Results from this project are expected this year.

Research has shown that pigs do not avoid an environment containing high concentrations of inert gases, such as argon. However, there are practical constraints to the use of inert gas mixtures for slaughter that have restricted commercial uptake so far. These include the need to expose pigs for longer periods of time in the inert gas mixture for unconsciousness to last until death.

We accept that there is a pressing need to address the welfare concerns associated with high concentration carbon dioxide stunning of pigs and look forward to receiving the Animal Welfare Committee’s report.