animal welfare

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NZ: Home of Rugby, Raping and Beer

Written By: - Date published: 3:30 pm, September 8th, 2016 - 103 comments

The whitewash of the rugby players who assaulted a woman at a post season piss up has been released. A mightily relieved rugby boss Steve Tew can now go into the rest of the season knowing that the All Black squad will not be affected by the loss of any players to suspension. The only person to have lost their job over the incident is the victim. How cool is that?

On Shooting the Messenger

Written By: - Date published: 9:10 am, December 14th, 2015 - 214 comments

Over the past decade we have seen sophisticated attacks against academics and NGOs who challenge government or industry. These attacks often appear organic in nature, but many times are in fact concerted efforts by the powerful.

Pre-election Factory Farming Debate

Written By: - Date published: 6:21 am, September 2nd, 2014 - 4 comments

WHEN: Wednesday 3rd September 6.30pm
WHERE: St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Participants: Shane Ardern (National), Trevor Mallard (Labour), Mojo Mathers (Greens), Richard Prosser (NZ First) and Miriam Pierard (Internet).

Pig Farming Expose – A personal perspective

Written By: - Date published: 6:30 am, June 30th, 2014 - 161 comments

Last night the Sunday show screened an expose of a Christchurch pig farm using footage provided by Farmwatch New Zealand. I was part of the investigation which resulted in this show and thought I would provide a more personal perspective on this story. I will also do my best to respond to comments on this […]

Pike Road?

Written By: - Date published: 10:27 pm, June 21st, 2012 - 10 comments

A strong safety warning today about sheeptruck disaster met Ministerial indifference from Associate Transport Minister Simon Bridges. He said Australian legislation to promote safety and fairness in the road transport industry was not needed here because “New Zealand already has a system of work time requirements to help manage the risk of fatigue”. More infamous last words from a National politician – but the police are really worried.

Basher Bennett rides to Hekia’s rescue

Written By: - Date published: 3:26 pm, June 6th, 2012 - 41 comments

Same old National – when they’re in trouble, out comes the club for a distracting headline.  Hekia Parata’s under fire and digging herself  into a very deep hole, so Paula Bennett rides to the rescue with the “news” that Cabinet is discussing allowing judges to direct miscreant parents not to have children. Who knows what the judges think about this hospital pass – let’s hope the media sees it for what it is.

Does National care about animal welfare?

Written By: - Date published: 12:55 pm, September 16th, 2010 - 21 comments

National will vote against a Sue Kedgley’s member’s bill, which could see factory farms phased out within 5 years. Despite support from the Greens, Labour, United Future and the Maori Party, without National or ACT’s support this bill won’t pass it’s first reading. There’s no good excuse. The government needs to be shamed on this.

Pig Code of Welfare – last day to send submissions

Written By: - Date published: 12:00 am, April 16th, 2010 - 18 comments

Today is the last day to send in your submission on NAWAC’s draft Code of Welfare for Pigs. New Zealand Open Rescue have put out a new video containing footage from many different farms around the country, to remind you why it is important to have your say. You can send a submission using SAFE’s template at www.lovepigs.org.nz.

Whaling comic

Written By: - Date published: 10:52 am, April 14th, 2010 - 3 comments

Have you heard of Cyanide and Happiness? A web-comic that walks the line of funny and too far. They have an annual ‘depressing comics’ week. No punch lines. Given our Prime Minister’s aim to restore commercial whaling and the anti-whalers’ success in blocking the Japs from half their target of kills, thought this one would be appropriate [full comic]

Government by knee-jerk

Written By: - Date published: 1:56 pm, January 31st, 2010 - 22 comments

John Key has told us that his government’s unrelenting focus this year will be the economy. He has also said his government will focus unrelentingly on education. Already, it has relented to focus on increasing the maximum penalty for animal cruelty from three years to five. Of course what happened with the massacre of those […]

US Style Cow Stalls – what aspiration!

Written By: - Date published: 12:10 pm, December 14th, 2009 - 46 comments

In a year when New Zealand factory farming practices for pigs (and earlier for chickens) have been widely exposed and shocked the country, our dairy industry is looking at adopting similar practices for dairy cows. In a year when climate change has been on the world agenda as never before, our dairy industry is attempting […]

Levin Arrest and Police Escort

Written By: - Date published: 8:31 pm, December 12th, 2009 - 156 comments

This is a guest post by Jasmine because I couldn’t be bothered writing it myself 😉 Today Rochelle and I were hanging out in Levin, as you do on a Saturday afternoon, and decided to go check out the local layer hen slaughterhouse. There was no one around so we decided to climb the fence […]

New Generation Labour

Written By: - Date published: 3:30 pm, November 4th, 2009 - 12 comments

From Phil Twyford over at Red Alert on pig farming. This is Red Alert’s first video blog. Twyford manages to impress me on two of my favourite topics all in one post – technology and animal welfare. Hopefully on both topics this signals Labour moving forward. As the title of his post says: Time for […]

Code given “top priority” by Minister delayed – pigs continue to suffer

Written By: - Date published: 9:57 pm, November 2nd, 2009 - 18 comments

Tonight Campbell Live showed new footage recently shot by animal rights activists on four farms in Ashburton, Greytown, Blenheim and Kumeu. Six months on from the Mike King and Sunday exposé and it’s clear nothing has changed in the appalling treatment of pigs in this country. Not surprisingly, spokesperson for the Pork Board Sam McIvor […]

The farmer and his bloody cock

Written By: - Date published: 9:09 am, October 25th, 2009 - Comments Off on The farmer and his bloody cock

From the NZ Sound Archives‘ weekly feature comes a story involving a farmer, a lack of clothes, a barrel of molasses (treacle-like substance), and a rooster named henny-penny. It’s a bloody classic Kiwi story. Worthy of taking ten minutes out to listen to this Labour weekend.

Catcha Cray

Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, October 6th, 2009 - 15 comments

SAFE is campaigning against a new and very odd form of “entertainment” in pubs. Catcha Cray machines are just like arcade grab machines, with the key difference being that rather than the prize being a non-sentient soft toy, the prize is instead a living and feeling crayfish. SAFE’s campaign officer Mandy Carter says: Like the […]

World Farm Animal Day – Oct 2nd

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, October 2nd, 2009 - 24 comments

Following on from yesterdays guest post on World Vegetarian Day, today is World Farm Animal Day. At the end of last year, I was a little bit involved in a documentary created by Animal Liberation Aotearoa called “Who are you having for dinner? The reality of meat production in New Zealand“. On a trip up […]

World Vegetarian Day October 1st

Written By: - Date published: 10:32 am, October 1st, 2009 - 85 comments

I’m a vegetarian and today, October 1st, is the worldwide day to celebrate the benefits of not eating meat and the healthy contribution to a better society vegetarianism makes. The personal is political. My choice to eschew meat for 30 years has exposed me to abuse from chefs, sexually coded remarks from ‘red blooded’ men, […]

MAF “animal welfare” is a joke

Written By: - Date published: 6:06 pm, September 30th, 2009 - 24 comments

The recent news that NZ’s largest dairy farmer allowed calves to dehydrate and starve to death is appalling, but there are much larger issues here than this just being one rogue farm. The fact is, MAF animal welfare is a joke. They have only five animal welfare inspectors covering the entire country, so it’s really […]

Carter, do your job

Written By: - Date published: 12:12 pm, September 30th, 2009 - 46 comments

One area where I agree with Fran O’Sullivan is the dairy industry. Today she covers the Crafars: CraFarms’ bankers should do the decent thing and put the so-called dairy farming “giant” into receivership before its practices further decrease the value of its assets and bring New Zealand’s prime agriculture export industry into international disrepute. The […]

SIS? Or who’s spying now?

Written By: - Date published: 12:54 pm, September 13th, 2009 - 27 comments

On Thursday Animal Rights Activists did a protest outside the Norwegian Embassy against the fur trade there. This was to support the campaign in Norway, where activists have just released an investigation into 50 fur farms. During the protest a man was observed sitting in a car across the road taking photographs of the protest […]

Drinking Liberally Wgtn

Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, July 7th, 2009 - 1 comment

Just received this from Drinking Liberally Wellington: We hope you’ve enjoyed our unannounced winter break. We’re back this Thursday, at 5:30 at the Southern Cross on Abel Smith Street. This week our special guest speaker is Mark Eden, from the Wellington Animal Rights Network. He will be speaking on “Sow crates, battery hens and not […]

MAF investigation report released

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, July 3rd, 2009 - 16 comments

MAF has released the final report of their investigation into the pig farm owned by former Pork Board Director Colin Kay, exposed on the Sunday programme in May. As all those who knew anything about the Animal Welfare Act and subsidiary Codes of Welfare predicted, the farm in question has been found to be operating […]

So, what are you going to do?

Written By: - Date published: 5:22 pm, June 25th, 2009 - 8 comments

Over at the Labour MPs’ blog, Red Alert, Brendon Burns has written a piece criticising Agriculture Minister David Carter on the welfare of pigs in sow crates. But while it’s good to see Labour, or at least a Labour MP, finally take a stand on the sow crate issue (God knows the Tories won’t), I […]

Pigs, kiwis… and a king!

Written By: - Date published: 12:23 am, June 22nd, 2009 - 6 comments

From SAFE: Join Mike King, one of New Zealand’s leading comedians and pig campaigners, launch an exciting new pig-friendly initiative to help end pig suffering in New Zealand. Mike King has become the country’s most notable ambassador against pig crates. Hear how he went from the ‘King of Pork’ to a champion for pigs. Hosted […]

It’s called sovereignty, stupid!

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, June 9th, 2009 - 9 comments

The Minister of Agriculture David Carter really outdid himself in the house last week. First he completely dodged and didn’t address the question put to him by Sue Kedgley on the use of sow crates. Next, clearly feeling the pressure he had a National backbencher ask him a nice easy question with which he took […]

Pork Board desperation and farm tour success

Written By: - Date published: 7:06 am, June 5th, 2009 - 15 comments

Animal Liberation Aotearoa (ALA) have for the past year or so been running a series of farm tours, taking members of the public onto factory farms to see for themselves how they work. They do these openly and in broad daylight, accepting the possible risk of minor criminal charges that may result (though thus far none have).

Pigs

Written By: - Date published: 10:00 am, May 27th, 2009 - 15 comments

It’s good to see Green MP Sue Kedgley calling on John Key to personally fix the abuse of pigs in sow crates. The chair of Nawac appears incapable of seeing that there’s even a problem, and the Minister of Agriculture has already been caught misleading the public on national television to defend the industry. It’s […]

Minister of Agriculture misled the public

Written By: - Date published: 5:59 pm, May 26th, 2009 - 19 comments

It seems the Minister of Agriculture David Carter misled the public regarding his knowledge of the use of sow crates in pig farming, when he stated on the Sunday Programme on May 17th, “No I didn’t know to the extent to which they were confined other than for farrowing purposes” During question time in the […]

The Pork industry, circa 1860

Written By: - Date published: 10:30 am, May 21st, 2009 - 30 comments

Pork Board engages in doublespeak

Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, May 20th, 2009 - 60 comments

Chair of the NZ Pork Industry Board Chris Trengrove told Campbell Live last night, “The industry is changing and has been changing since 2005, we’ve been monitoring those changes, um, we have over half of the industry now out of the stalls altogether…” He then went on to say that research shows sows stalls are […]