Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
MR PETER
STEVENSON
10 JUNE 2003
Chairman: Mr Peter Stevenson, you are
the Political and Legal Director of Compassion in World Farming.
Welcome to the first evidence session of this inquiry. You will
have noted that the Committee is examining the state of poultry
farming and looking particularly at the impact of new regulations
on the industry on its competitiveness and on animal welfare standards.
It seems an appropriate time for the inquiry as the consumption
of chickens seems to steadily increase in this country, 800 million
I think you say in your submission, and there are regular controversies
which hit the press, most recently in relation to the use of antibiotics,
and in the past the state of the poultry industry has done for
at least one Minister who represented a seat next to mine in South
Derbyshire.
Mr Mitchell: And they are an alternative
to fish!
Q1 Chairman: "Austin Haddock"
puts that onto the record. You have welcomed this inquiry as you
say "the poultry industry presents a range of serious animal
welfare problems" and your evidence goes on in some detail
to spell out why you believe that is justified, but would you
accept that there are not some current practices in poultry farming
which have benefited the welfare of the animals in recent times,
some improvements that have been made?
Mr Stevenson: I welcome the fact
that over about the last ten years the proportion of free-range
on the egg-laying side has gone from probably 10% to something
like 23%. I see this as a slow but marked move away from caged
production to free-range, but still we have got 71% of hens in
battery cages, so my overall feeling about the poultry industry
is that on both sides, the egg-laying and meat side, that really
far-reaching reforms are needed, although I would also, and I
hope I will have the opportunity to stress this, say that I believe
this can be done in an economically viable way. I am not saying
reform the poultry industry and let us watch it lose market share.
Q2 Chairman: There are all sorts
of way of killing a cat and breeding a chicken, I suppose, and
one approach to any concerns there might be would be a licensing
system, which is what the RSPCA are particularly keen on. They
say that it is the only way to ensure compliance with the minimum
standards. Do you share their view on this and what sort of discussion
with the RSPCA and liaison do you have with them as an organisation?
Mr Stevenson: We have liaison
broadly with them but not necessarily in detail. I think generally
licensing of farms, poultry or otherwise, can be very helpful
in terms of maintaining standards, in terms of the ultimate possibility
that in a really bad case that licence could be suspended or even
withdrawn, but it is not one of the points I covered in my submission
so I am not ranking it very high in the reforms I would like to
see. For me on the egg-laying side, clearly I welcome the fact
that at the EU level the conventional battery cage is prohibited
from 2012. The big further step, though, I would like to see is
the EU as a whole, with hopefully the United Kingdom taking the
lead in persuading our European partners, prohibiting the so-called
enriched cage. Looking at the scientific evidence it is clear
to me that the enriched cage offers no significant worthwhile
benefits.
Q3 Mr Mitchell: Can you tell us what
an enriched cage is?
Mr Stevenson: The Directive has
prohibited what has become known as the conventional battery cage
but it has not prohibited the enriched cage so if you want to
use an enriched cage you have to have 600 cm2 of usable space
per hen, which is a only slight improvement on the conventional
cage, you have got to have a slightly greater height with an enriched
cage, it is 45 cm. In my terms the nest box you have got to have
with an enriched cage is too small to be useful. You have got
to have 15 cm of perch space per bird and you have got to have
some litter in the cage so the birds can dust bathe.
Q4 Mr Wiggin: When you say the nest
box is too small to be useful, are you saying that chickens do
not use it?
Mr Stevenson: No.
Q5 Mr Wiggin: What percentage of
eggs are laid outside the nest box?
Mr Stevenson: A number of studies
both in this country and Sweden have shown that in the region
of ten to 15% are laid outside the nest box.
Q6 Mr Wiggin: Which is probably the
same for free-range as well.
Mr Stevenson: The point is in
natural conditions hens would spend quite a considerable time
nesting, probably one to two hours at the beginning of the day.
Q7 Mr Wiggin: Come on, that is nonsense.
Mr Stevenson: Within the enriched
cage, a combination of the fact that the nest box is small plus
the fact that the cage is very crowded, there are competing hens
there, means that I do not think it is satisfying the hen's need
to lay her egg in a nest to a satisfactory degree from the hen
welfare point of view. I am saying that all the various items—the
amount of floor space, the height, the nest box, the perch (which
is only 15 cm per hen) and the litter, which is there for dust
bathing and scratching and pecking—are clearly an improvement
on the conventional cage but very disappointing from a hen welfare
point of view. I am absolutely clear in my mind that it would
be an immense pity if what the Hens Directive led to was merely
production going from conventional cages to enriched cages. I
emphasise that I am really looking for an EU-wide move not a unilateral
UK one, I am being politically realistic and saying I recognise
this needs to happen at an EU level, I would like to see farmers
not going from one kind of cage to another kind of cage but to
well-managed barn or free-range systems.
Q8 Mr Wiggin: Have you ever kept
chickens?
Mr Stevenson: No, I have not.
Q9 Mr Wiggin: That is quite obvious.
Mr Stevenson: But I really am
familiar with the science on this so I am not speaking in an anthropomorphic
way. I think what I am saying is based clearly on the science.
Q10 Mr Mitchell: I kept chickens
and they all drowned in the outside lavatory by putting their
heads down there for some reason! What you advocate is a counsel
of the impossible. There are not enough barns to go round and
you cannot have them free-range because we have not got enough
space. You say some 12% of the hens are free-range in France and
some pathetic proportion in Britain is but France is a much bigger
country. I have talked to poultry farmers in Lincolnshire and
they say they will have to pack up because they have not got the
space.
Mr Stevenson: The figure of 12%
in France was for the broilers, the meat birds. Already in this
country 29% of egg production is not in cages. I honestly believe
that no proper study has been done on land availability and I
find it hard to believe that it would be impossible for our production
to move over to a combination of barn and free-range. Barn is
not requiring a great deal of extra space per bird. You must also
remember in the period 50 years ago after the last War we had
many more chickens in this country. The hen flock has gone down
because of improvements in productivity. 50 years ago all chickens
were kept free-range. There are a number of problems, and I do
not think lack of space is some sort of insuperable problem.
Q11 Mr Mitchell: So you think we
could cope with a fully free-range and barn combination?
Mr Stevenson: It would be a combination
of barn and free-range and clearly I would like to see more of
it free-range than barn, but again I am trying to be realistic
and I realise a significant proportion would be barn. Remember,
I am saying all this in the context of two things. First of all,
I do not believe enriched cages offer any worthwhile welfare benefits
to hens. Secondly, I have a strong feeling as a humane society,
and I am talking about the EU as a whole, not just ourselves,
we cannot go forward for the decades to come with hen rearing
systems that I believe are in welfare terms totally unacceptable.
We have got to, difficult though it may be, move forward to better
systems.
Q12 Mr Mitchell: We will come to
the cost of that later on. Surely the thing about enriched cages
is why do you not just call it a bigger cage? A bigger cage is
surely better than a nowt, better than a smaller one, just as
a three-bedroomed house is better than a two-bedroomed house?
Mr Stevenson: I fully accepted
and emphasised happily that I accept that the enriched cage is
an improvement on the ordinary cage, but I think only a very small
improvement, and I believe we should be going forward to no cages
at all, but instead to a combination of barn and free-range.
Q13 Mr Mitchell: You say that they
offer no worthwhile welfare benefits to the hens. The hens cannot
tell us anything so what research have you seen that shows that
they offer no worthwhile benefits?
Mr Stevenson: We published a report
about a year ago which was a review, a compilation of all the
scientific studies at that stage, and looking at each parameter—the
floor space, height and these various facilities—we came
to that judgment. If I can take floor space for example, traditionally
a battery cage provided 450 cm2 per hen but that has from 1 January
this year gone up to 550 cm2 and in an enriched cage there will
have to be 600 cm2 per hen of usable space plus 150 cm2 for the
nest box and any other facilities. Science going back many years
now establishes that there are some very basic movements of a
hen such as wing stretching and wing flapping which require much
more space than that. Wing stretching requires an average 890
cm2 and wing flapping requires 1,800 cm2, very much more than
is provided in an enriched cage. Wing stretching and wing flapping,
to take two examples, are important. They are not just natural
behaviours but you get greater bone strength if hens are able
to exercise in that way. One of the big problems of cage production,
one of the reasons why in the end the EU moved against it and
prohibited it, was there was a very high level of osteoporosis,
brittle bones, that a lack of exercise in the cage results in.
Because the hens still would not be able to do basic things like
wing stretching and wing flapping in the enriched cages I do not
think it would tackle the problem of bone brittleness. If you
look at the height of 45 cm, again the science establishes that
hens need a minimum of 46 cm but if it is available will use up
to 56 cm of height. Again, that leads to greater movement, greater
bone strength. I am very specific when I say I do not think there
are worthwhile welfare benefits. If you look at the dust bathing
facility where usually in an enriched cage you have got the nest
box at one side of it, front to back, and on top of it a small
litter area for dust bathing, again a number of studies (mainly
in Holland) have shown that the amount and depth of litter does
not allow satisfactory dust bathing and indeed the vast majority
of dust bathing, 70% or more in enriched cages, is happening not
in the litter provided but on the wire floor of the caging in
what we call sham or vacuum dust bathing. If I say there are no
worthwhile welfare benefits I am not just plucking this statement
out of the air, I think this is where the science is taking us.
Again, I would say to government both here and in EU let us use
the opportunity of the Hens Directive to have a really good welfare
reform rather than tinkering at the edges of the problem.
Q14 Mr Mitchell: Would a rather bigger
enriched cage suit your purposes? Is your opposition to cages
per se or would a bigger still cage be acceptable?
Mr Stevenson: I am not sure of
my answer to that. I understand what you are saying.
Q15 Mr Mitchell: It is a proposition
to the battery farming of hens where people like me go in and
see rows and rows and they are all clucking, and they all look
cramped and their feathers are falling off, they look a mess,
they are not turning round much, and there is a conveyor belt
in front of them that carries the eggs away, and think this is
awful, but if they were given more space would it solve the problem?
Mr Stevenson: One could conceive
in theory of the possibility of such a case if you had enough
space to allow movements like stretching and wing flapping and
the behaviours of perching, dust bathing and scratching and pecking
at the ground. I think the amount of space you are talking about
would mean economically at that point you would be better off
going into a barn system or a free-range system so I think the
economics would mitigate against it.
Q16 Mr Mitchell: Why do you think
the Farm Animal Welfare Council has called for further research
before it can make a judgment?
Mr Stevenson: I suspect that a
lot of research is going on currently. The opinion I am expressing
now is based on the scientific research as it currently exists
but I am clear that from my point—and of course I would
be interested to see further science—I would be very surprised
if it is going to come up with different results unless, as you
say, the floor space, height and facilities become very different.
As I say, the difference in floor space per hen in the conventional
cage has gone up from 1 January to 550 cm2 per hen. In terms of
usable space, ie not including the nest box, that is just 50 cm2
per hen[1].
This is not a lot of difference. Again I come back to the height.
It is important that hens should be able to have a full range
of natural head movements if there is going to be proper bone
strength. A height of 45 cm, although a bit better than a conventional
cage, does not do it. At the kind of dimensions set down in the
Directive for enriched cages, I am sorry, I do remain of the view
they are not the way forward, whereas I think a well-managed and
well-designed free-range or barn system can offer very good benefits.
Q17 Mr Wiggin: Have you considered
the human health implications? One of the problems with barn and
free-range is it is possible to get muck on the eggs and that
has a human health implication, which of course the battery system
does not.
Mr Stevenson: Are you talking
particularly about the dangers of salmonella?
Chairman: Before we move on to that can
we finalise on welfare. Diana?
Q18 Diana Organ: You had said in
comments to colleagues that you are really looking for no cages
at all. Ideally what you would like is a system that was totally
free-range and barn. I wonder if you could give me two bits of
information. At the beginning you talked about the growth of the
free-range market. What have you to say about what a barn egg
is and in so much as I think the consumer of them, when they look
at the shelves you can have organic free-range, you can have free-range,
you can have barn, sometimes does not quite know what they are
getting. What is the barn system and what percentage of the UK
market is given over to the barn system?
Mr Stevenson: To answer the second
question first, it is quite small, it is about five point something%
as opposed to free-range which is about 23%. Interestingly, most
producers who have gone away from cages have gone to free-range,
and I welcome that. The barn system, and again the precise dimensions
are laid down in the Directive, is a system in which the birds
are kept exclusively indoors, they have no access to outdoors,
but they are not in any sort of cage so they are able to move
around and, indeed, fly, so there is both lateral and vertical
movement within a large barn.
Q19 Diana Organ: You made the contention
that you felt if we dismantled all the cages it would not require
a lot of extra space. I have Dean Eggs in my constituency and
they have both free-range and battery operations and I have been
to see the battery operation. As Mr Wiggin pointed out, it is
stacked up. I looked at these sheds and there is no way that you
could cover the area by just doubling, tripling or quadrupling
the size taken up by the battery operation that I saw because
thousands of them are stacked three or four high. Your aim is
to get rid of cages, to put all the egg production into either
organic or barn because of an animal welfare point of view, but
we recognise that the consumer is only taking five% of this market,
those that come out of battery go straight to organic because
of the premium, and I think it is recognised that the space required
by egg producers just is not available for them. So the barn system
is not an option out, is it?
Mr Stevenson: If I can say, I
am not advocating that organic is one of the main alternatives.
I welcome organic production but when I talk about wanting to
see barn or free-range, I am not necessarily saying that should
be organic at all. I have not done the exact arithmetic within
a barn system of how many square centimetres of floor space a
hen has but, yes, you do need more room in a barn system for a
given number of hens, I do not think it is vastly more and I do
not think lack of space in the UK as a whole is a major problem.
I think there are bigger problems, although I do not think they
are insuperable ones. I am very sympathetic to hen producers who
tell me they have planning permission problems when they want
to move over to barn and free-range. Remember, I said earlier
I want it to happen, and I believe it can happen, in an economically
viable way but government and industry have to develop a strategy
and one problem that has to be solved is planning permission difficulties,
a more sympathetic attitude from local authorities to barn and
free-range must be taken. Above all, and I am sure you will ask
me questions about this later, I want to talk about the economics
because I believe there are ways in which that can be addressed.
1 Note by Witness: More in an enriched cage
than in a conventional cage. Back
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