Lumley lures MPs to animal cause

Lumley lures MPs to animal cause

By Jackie Storer
BBC News Online political staff

Lumley: MPs and MEPs should lobby for a ban

Her stunning good looks may have lured a crowd of male MPs into a packed House of Commons backroom - but Joanna Lumley pulled no punches when they arrived.

The actress, a patron of Compassion in World Farming (CIWF), was calling on the cross-party group to lobby Environment Secretary Margaret Beckett to do what she can to end the transport of live animals.

To add weight to her appeal, the charity showed horrific video "evidence" compiled by CIWF investigators of the cruel trade which sees cattle, sheep, horses and pigs enduring journeys of up to 90 hours in cramped lorries, with little ventilation and no water.

In the mean time, CIWF is also calling for European Union Agriculture Ministers to enact a law imposing an eight hour limit on journeys of animals to slaughter.

More than 40 MPs crammed in to the Jubilee Room in the House of Commons to witness the video - but many turned away at one scene of a cow being suspended by one leg before having its throat cut.

Ms Lumley's softly toned, unemotional commentary provided a chilling contrast to the images of horses collapsing with exhaustion and a bull being forcefully pushed into a small metal box.

The scale of the cruelty involved in animal transport is truly appalling

Joanna Lumley

The former Bond Girl and New Avenger, who received a Bafta for her role as Patsy in Absolutely Fabulous, told how a hundred thousand cattle a year are sent from Ireland for fattening in Spain and Italy, with many enduring journeys of between 50 and 60 hours.

She contrasted the early life of these cows reared in the green fields of Ireland, to their latter days allegedly kept in over-crowded conditions, intensely fed on a diet of cereals that cause digestive disorders.

European directive

Investigators who watched one shipment of sheep travelling for between 50 and 80 hours from the UK to France, saw animals suffering from over-crowding and exhaustion without a working water supply, she said.

A badly injured sow, unable to walk, was kicked as she was unloaded to get her to move.

Ms Lumley commented: "The scale of the cruelty involved in animal transport is truly appalling.

"Everyone should be calling on their MPs and MEPs to act to ban long distance animal transport."

We are asking MPs to do what they can to put pressure on the government to end the transportation of live animals from the UK

Joyce D'Silva

The launch of the video, which is being translated into Portuguese, French and Dutch for wider distribution, coincides with expectation that the European Commission will shortly produce a new draft directive on the transport of animals.

At an Agriculture Council discussion last year, nine of the EU's 15 countries said they wanted an eight-hour travel limit.

Joyce D'Silva, CIWF's chief executive, said: "Animal transport is continuing to be carried out in a manner that causes enormous suffering to animals.

"We are asking MPs to do what they can to put pressure on the government to end the transportation of live animals from the UK, but also to take the lead in Europe in calling for a maximum eight hour journey limit.

"At the moment, legally, you can take sheep on a journey for 28 hours, just stopping for one hour on the way - you don't even have to give them water or unload them."

While the animals should then have 24 hours unloaded rest, it is possible for them to travel for a further 28 hours, Ms D'Silva told BBC News Online.

"They can go from Aberdeen to Athens and we are saying that is ridiculous," she said.

'Terrible trauma'

Ms D'Silva said it was also "unacceptable" that taxpayers' money was being used to export live cattle from the EU to third countries, such as in the Middle East and North Africa, forcing the creatures to suffer long journeys, brutal unloading and slaughter methods.

CIWF wants the government to set up a working group of interested parties, including the charity, the sheep industry and supermarkets to see how the trade can move away from live exports to meat exports.

Labour's Gwyn Prosser, the MP for Dover who has spent years campaigning for an end to live animal exports, said he had seen the "terrible trauma" for animals sent out on ships in anything from a force eight gale to storm force 10.

"I have seen it and you don't need to be a vetinery surgeon to see that they are suffering."

Having heeded Ms Lumley's serious message, the male MPs quickly formed a queue to have their photographs taken with the blonde actress - to help them publicise the campaign in their constituencies. Of course.