Pig Brutality

waterford | animal rights | other press Thursday June 23, 2005 01:32 by B Wright - AFAR berniew at esatclear dot ie PO Box 4734. Dublin1. -

Article: Labour fury at 'Brutal' culling of pigs

The Department of Agriculture has been slammed over claims a farmer was
forced to kill his pigs with a sledgehammer. The incident took places on
a farm in Co.Waterford in 2002 but details only emerged this weekend.
The department had suspected the 4,300 pigs were being fed with
carbodox-an illegal substance linked to cancer in humans-and insisted
they be destroyed.

The Sun newspaper 20/06/05
Article: Labour fury at 'Brutal' culling of pigs

Start:

The Department of Agriculture has been slammed over claims a farmer was
forced to kill his pigs with a sledgehammer. The incident took places on
a farm in Co.Waterford in 2002 but details only emerged this weekend.
The department had suspected the 4,300 pigs were being fed with
carbodox-an illegal substance linked to cancer in humans-and insisted
they be destroyed.

But, because of fears of contamination, the porkers could not be sent to
a slaughterhouse and had to be killed on the farm-at the farmers
expense. A stun-gun was being used but it broke and about 50 pigs were
killed with the sledgehammer. The farmer said: "It was awful, but they
forced me to do it. I had no alternative."

Labour agricultural spokeswoman Mary Upton, called for a full
investigation yesterday. She claimed: "It appears there was little
support available to the farms when he was faced with the problem of
slaughtering 4,000 pigs and this appears to have contributed to the
shocking scenes. "It is simple not good enough for the Department of
Agriculture to shrug its shoulders and say the department inspectors
present made no adverse comments in their reports."

A department spokesperson said nothing illegal had taken place during
the cull. He added that a court case was pending over the allegations
that illegal substances had been fed to the animals.