Day 108 - 27 Mar 95 - Page 08

     
     1        Experimental Husbandry Farm, and another one near Crewe,
     2        which name I have forgotten.   We have been into that sort
     3        of place as well and in universities, colleges, but mainly
     4        it has been working farms.
     5
     6   Q.   Your purpose in buying the birds was to study?
     7        A.  To study them and to also show them to the public and
     8        there have been occasions like television programme where
     9        we have wanted to show them on them and for photography
    10        purposes to make leaflets and posters, so there have been
    11        various motives for buying them.
    12
    13   Q.   Do you feel you have learned a great deal as a result of
    14        studying them? .
    15        A.  Yes, because we have stopped for ever the theory that
    16        you can breed out behavioural patterns because it is
    17        totally impossible apart from things like broodiness which
    18        are not possible to select for quite easily, but things
    19        like dust-bathing, foraging in the ground, and I am not
    20        trying to be amusing, but walking, they are not bred out of
         animals by drastically altering, the accommodation.
    22
    23   Q.   I will come back to the behavioural -----
    24        A.  Sorry, may I just add that nesting is one of the most
    25        important deprivations of the laying hen.
    26
    27   Q.   Can you describe the sort of conditions that you have
    28        observed in the units that you have been into?
    29        A.  Yes, first of all, it is the extreme confinement of the
    30        birds which can really never walk a single step unimpeded
    31        where they can jostle with each other and move around in
    32        that respect, but in no sense do they walk in a cage.  Also
    33        the cage floor is incredibly unsuitable for their feet.
    34        They did believe that the chicken wire, which was the old
    35        fashioned kind of flooring for battery cages, was
    36        particularly uncomfortable.
    37
    38        But, in fact, research has shown that the more modern type,
    39        which is the kind of oblong mesh of more resistant wire, is
    40        actually far worse for their feet, and this is far more
         common now because the mesh is more generalised and they do
    42        not slide down between the gaps.
    43
    44   Q.   So the thicker, more spread out wire is the one that is
    45        more commonly used now?
    46        A.  It is more commonly used now and it is less comfortable
    47        for them, according to scientists.
    48
    49   Q.   In terms of observing and checking on birds in the battery
    50        units, what is your opinion on that? 
    51 
    52   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, I do not want to make life awkward for 
    53        the Defendants but I do want to save the court's time
    54        wherever it is possible to do so.  I remind your Lordship
    55        that the only allegation made about battery hens in the
    56        Defence has been admitted in full, which is that McDonald's
    57        uses eggs supplied by -----
    58
    59   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Hold on.  Sit down, please, Mrs. Druce.
    60