Holly Spindler
It’s been 7 years since the referendum, but what’s changed for animals in that time?
Today marks seven years since the Brexit referendum, when the Government committed to using Brexit to make the UK ‘a world leader on animal welfare’. But how far have we really come?
Following the referendum, a coalition of animal protection groups came together to campaign for a #BetterDealForAnimals to ensure that a move away from Europe would strengthen, not weaken, legal protections for animals in the UK.
Brexit provided an opportunity for the UK to rethink our approach to food and farming to positively impact our treatment of animals, sustainability, and the health of British people.
Sadly, for animals raised for food, positive change in the last few years has been limited.
Animal sentience
The most public success has been the Animal Sentience Act which passed last year. This Act symbolically recognises animals as sentient and, most significantly, includes cephalopod molluscs (including mussels, squids, and octopuses) and decapod crustaceans (such as crabs, lobsters, and prawns).
With Europe not addressing recent scientific progression in animal sentience, the UK has an opportunity here to become a world leader in protecting cephalopod molluscs and decapod crustaceans. But, while the Sentience Act recognises these animals feel pain, the Government has made no further commitment to widening current animal protection legislation to cover them.
Live animal transport
During the Brexit campaign, the ability to ban the live export of animals for slaughter was championed as a benefit of leaving the EU. Live animal transport is the process of moving animals from one location to another, usually to get them to the slaughterhouse. It is extremely stressful for animals, as well as often leading to injury or even death.
Despite the ban of this practice being included in the 2019 Conservative Manifesto and DEFRA’s Action Plan for Animal Welfare, and despite other European countries like Germany already having a ban in place, live exports have not yet been banned in the UK.
Introduced in 2021, the Kept Animals Bill did promise to ban live exports, as well as additional protections for dogs, animals kept in zoos, and primates. After months of no progress, the Government has now announced that the Bill will be scrapped. This leaves millions of animals suffering long, uncomfortable, stressful journeys just to be slaughtered at the end.
Cages
Every year in the UK, over 16 million farmed animals are confined to cages for all or part of their lives.
Making up a huge portion of this number are hens. All over Europe, countries like Luxembourg and Austria are banning cages for egg-laying hens. Despite all UK supermarkets committing to stop selling eggs from caged hens by 2025, the UK Government has yet to make cages illegal for hens.
While sow stalls (narrow crates which confine pigs for the whole of their pregnancy) are banned for pigs, more than half (over 200,000 each year) of female pigs in the UK are placed in farrowing crates a few days before giving birth. They are kept in these confined crates until their piglets are three or four weeks old.
Again, the UK is falling behind other nations who have banned or limited farrowing crates such as Germany, Switzerland, and Sweden.
The British public want to see an end to cages. A citizens initiative in 2019 gained over 1.4 million signatures and a petition on the Government website gained over 109,000 signatures. As the Government lags behind, millions of animals are suffering in cages.
Trade
The protections that animals receive in this country mean little if the UK Government makes trade deals allowing products that do not have equal considerations to be imported into this country.
Animal protection organisations have been pressuring the Government to act to the benefit of both animals and the UK economy by preventing this.
At this time, the Government has made limited concessions. It has amended the Agriculture Bill so that the Secretary of State must produce a report on whether measures in proposed Trade Agreements are consistent with UK levels of protection. Also, in 2020 the Government established a Trade and Agriculture Commission to advise them on matters of trade policy, including animal welfare. Sadly, no representatives from animal welfare charities have been included in the Commission.
It’s a very real and present concern. A recent trade agreement, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), allows imports of eggs and pig meat into the UK from countries such as Canada and Mexico, where barren battery cages and sow stalls are still legal.
Summary
Today the Better Deal for Animals coalition published a report has that further details the progress (or lack of) in animal protection legislation since Brexit.
It’s not a positive read.
The Conservative manifesto of 2019 states, 'From freeports to free trade deals, from abolishing the cruel live shipment of animals...we in the UK will be able to remain close to our European friends and partners; but where we choose, we will be able to do things differently and better.'
Sadly, we’ve seen very little of this progress for animals raised for food and the change that has been publicised seems mostly symbolic, to placate a UK public that is hungry for change for animals.
But we’re not giving up. We’re working hard lobbying the Government to do better. We’re focusing on the animals that suffer in the greatest numbers; hens and fishes.
If you’d like to join us and add your voice for animals, sign up now.
