3,500 complaints of ‘cruelty’

Sunday Mail April 29, 2001

THE RSPCA is investigating 3,500 complaints from farmers and members of the public worried about animal welfare in the face of the epidemic.

The organisation says many calls are from farmers reporting allegations of cruelty and desperately asking for help with dying livestock that cannot be moved because of the restrictions.

Others are from members of the public who believe the scenes of slaughter they are witnessing constitute animal cruelty.

The complaints have been received at the RSPCA’s headquarters and ten regional offices over the last few weeks.

Currently, 80 of the charity’s inspectors in the South West, who have been removed from normal duties, are helping tackle the crisis.

At least two prosecutions are expected in connection with cruelty. Both involve the shooting of sheep with rifles as part of the Government’s cull of healthy animals: one in Monmouthshire, South Wales, the other in Devon.

In both cases slaughtermen were seen running across open fields taking pot shots at sheep with an ordinary rifle.

Eye witnesses reported it as the most horrific thing they had ever seen.

Farmers whose animals are suffering because they cannot be moved from overcrowded barns or muddy fields are unlikely to face any kind of punishment.

‘The farmers need help, they are in utter despair. Our job is to help them, not add to their worries,’ said an RSPCA spokesman.

‘These are some of the worst problems this country has ever seen. We have farmers phoning us in tears because they are being blocked by red tape and cannot move their animals to more suitable places.’

Two days ago the RSPCA hired slaughtermen to kill 450 ewes and lambs at Combe Martin farm, north Devon, that were trapped in mud so thick that dozens of lambs were drowning.

And a new crisis is emerging —starvation. Urgent appeals are going out to the public to help provide feed, shelter and bedding for the animals that cannot be moved. In some cases farmers have sufficient food but because of the restrictions they cannot move it to where their animals are.

Ten special regional schemes are being set up to co-ordinate offers of help from the public. ‘fransport, hay, feedstuffs and wood chippings are urgently needed.

John Tresidder, the RSPCA’s South,West regional superintendent, said: ‘We are asking the public to contact us with any support they can offer and for farmers to let us know if they are in difficulty.