Day 290 - 30 Oct 96 - Page 08
1 also referred to the consensus of opinion that 120
2 milliamps is likely to cause cardiac arrest in almost all
3 of the birds, and that that was desirable, and that there
4 were companies' processing plants using that method who
5 supply well-known supermarkets and Harrods with no
6 complaints of carcass, or, you know, no problems about
7 carcass quality. So basically the effect of that was there
8 was no reason why Sun Valley could not use the same methods
9 which were considered to be about the most humane way of
10 slaughtering poultry.
11
12 Can I just refer to a report which was cited by Mrs.
13 Druce. This was on day 109, page 18. It was a paper
14 produced by the RSPCA, or written by Dr. Potter from the
15 RSPCA who was head of the Farm Animals Department. She
16 quoted him as saying in this report, and the document is in
17 the bundle so it can be checked: "Chicken meat production
18 goes on behind closed doors and the public would be
19 horrified if they could see the conditions in which their
20 Sunday roasts live." Obviously, that would apply to
21 chickens made into Chicken McNuggets as well, it is not
22 just about chickens made for Sunday roasts. We would say
23 that this is completely true and, I mean, this is relevant
24 to what you were raising the other day about whether or not
25 it would be defamatory of the Plaintiffs about the fact
26 that animals were reared and slaughtered in this way or
27 whether or not -----
28
29 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, no, that is a complete misunderstanding
30 of what I meant to say. What I was expressing was doubt as
31 to whether it is defamatory to say simply that someone is
32 responsible for the slaughter of large numbers of animals
33 for food and the same might apply to responsibility for
34 suffering of animals, because, whether you like it or not
35 and however many vegetarians there may be in the United
36 Kingdom, bearing in mind the Charlesworth case -- do you
37 remember that was the one with the neighbour's picture --
38 I have to go through the exercise of the putative ordinary
39 reader, and it may be that the ordinary person does not
40 think it is defamatory to say of someone they are
41 responsible for the deaths of large numbers of animals, or
42 simply that they are responsible for suffering, because
43 that begs an issue as to the degree of suffering and it may
44 be that the ordinary person accepts that a certain amount
45 of suffering is involved in the life of animals reared for
46 food, just as it is involved in normal human existence.
47
48 You do not actually have to worry about this. It is a bit
49 of a red herring because at the moment I have no doubt that
50 the leaflet actually means more than that, but that was the
51 sole context of it all. You would only have to worry about
52 it if I said at the end of the day, 'All the leaflet means
53 is that McDonald's are responsible for the deaths of a
54 large number of animals and they are responsible for some
55 suffering, not culpably responsible, just responsible for
56 some suffering.' And that is the whole extent of the
57 comment I was making. So it does not stand in the way of
58 any of your arguments.
59
60 I personally feel, at the moment, not having heard all the
