It looks as if this video clip is not available online yet.
Use the enquiry button on the right and we’ll get back to you to discuss the quickest way for you to view it.
We open with shots of pampered dogs and their owners at the Crufts dog show (cut to music) which then cuts to cruel farming scenes showing a distressed pig and a chicken having its beak cut off. Interview with Ruth Harrison who wrote a book in the 1960s that first warned of the risks posed by intensive farming (her book was called Animal Machines). We see her on her own free range farm which then cuts to views of battery hens and pigs kept in cramped conditions. In 1964 the government set up a working party to look at the problem. Graphic text shows some of their findings. Their recommendations were not put into practice and many things are now worse.
We then see battery egg production. Interview with Ted Kirkwood who is the NFU poultry spokesman who runs his own battery farm. He explains how it works. Interview with John Douglas, an animal behaviour expert from the RSPCA who talks about the problems faced by the confined birds. Further shots of birds being de-beaked (from amateur video) and shots of chickens rescued by animal welfare campaigners and amateur video showing birds being dragged out of their cages when they can no longer lay. Interview with free range egg producer Terry Husson about the ethics of egg production and the difficulty of making it pay if free range principals are followed. We see Terry Husson with her birds. Next we visit Banbury livestock market where we see animals in pens and auction. Interview with Arthur Williams from Nat West who has studied the agricultural industry. He talks about the decline in farming and the difficulty of free range farmers competing.
Next in the Cotswolds we meet free range pig farmer David Styles who shows how it can be a viable option. He says that it is time for the industry to start again and says that massive amounts of drugs will no longer be needed. Views of a butcher’s shop (antibiotics have been found in meat recently). Shots of intensively reared pigs including a tethered sow and extract from Compassion in World Farming video showing how cruel the practice of tethering is. Back on the farm run by David Styles he shows the alternatives to tethering and the industry’s ‘farrowing crate’ and we see a piglet being born.
Narrated by Libby Purvis
Cameras: Bob Bolt; Peter Rance
Sound: Dennis Fitch; Del Fuke; Robin Ward
Production Assistant: Chris Fewlass
Production Secretary: Annie Clarke
Graphics: Stuart Kettle
Research: Herbert Giradet; Kate Newington
Film Editor: Ken Jones
Producer: Vivica Parsons
Director: Nick Davidson
Thanks to Animal Liberation Front; Chicken Lib; Compassion in World Farming; National Farmers Union; Rare Breed Survival Trust; RSPCA
Production number 1176/88.