Stores drop supplier over ‘appalling’ piglet slaughter

Workers have been filmed violently killing piglets by slamming them against concrete floors at a third farm owned by a major supermarket meat supplier after the firm promised it had banned the practice.

- JANE DALTON

Secret cameras captured staff illegally killing young animals by “blunt-force trauma” at a farm owned by Cranswick, Britain’s biggest pig producer, which supplies retailers with products including bacon and ham. Some animals were left writhing in agony and slowly dying over 20 minutes, according to activists who investigated Mere Farm, Barton-upon-Humber, Lincolnshire. The video shows workers kicking aside piglets with head injuries that had been “thumped” this way.

Tesco, Asda and Morrisons suspended the farm when The Independent showed them the footage, and Cranswick sacked four staff.

The company says it has introduced changes to reduce cruelty since much of the footage was taken, including installing hundreds of cameras on its 45 farms and retraining staff. But one worker seen in the latest footage, who was later sacked, had completed his training only around 10 days earlier.

It’s the third of the company’s farms in under five months where staff have been found inflicting painful deaths and suffering on pigs. In May, workers were seen “slamming” piglets to death at North Moor Farm, Lincolnshire. The company said it launched an investigation, then at its July AGM said it had banned this killing technique.