Opinion: Affect your MP on the way forward for the slaughterhouses earlier than it is too late

Since we have had a pub for seven years, where we serve our own organic Sussex beef and Southdown lamb from our own production, regular trips to local slaughterhouses are integrated into my everyday agricultural life.

Imagine my alarm when I was trying to book a fat two year old ox into one of these facilities (three weeks in advance) only to say, “You can, Stephen. I just hope that we will still be open until then. “

See also: Why Local Slaughterhouses Are At Risk and How Farms Are Affected

About the author

Stephen Carr

Writer of the Farmers Weekly Opinion

Stephen Carr and his wife Fizz run an 8,000 acre sheep, arable and cattle farm in the South Downs near Eastbourne. A portion is converted to organic status and is subject to a higher-level stewardship agreement.

This slaughterhouse, it seems, is threatening to become part of a worrying trend that will see more and more small, local slaughterhouses closing their doors for good.

The reasons for these closings always seem to be the same: mountains of bureaucracy, wafer-thin profit margins, insufficient liquid funds to justify investments in modernizing the plants, succession issues and the difficulty of recruiting qualified personnel.

Given the nature of the work in slaughterhouses, it’s not difficult to see why, with our increasingly anthropomorphic view of animals, there isn’t a queue of eager young Britons queuing to occupy the slaughter lines.

The ability to have my native exotic breeds of cattle and sheep delivered to a local slaughterhouse to be served in a local pub has become critical to two businesses I run.

The government’s idiotic refusal to include slaughterhouse staff on the priority “shortage manpower list” since Brexit has not helped the shortage of foreign slaughterhouses.

As for the other reasons for the closure of slaughterhouses, it appears that little can be done about the disproportionate amount of paperwork caused by very small shipments of animals.

Nor is it easy to see how small slaughterhouses can raise their costs on behalf of customers.

The throughput of small slaughterhouses often affects rare breeds with unusually thick or furry skin, long horns or higher fat cover, etc.

Many of the producers of these animals are small-scale farmers who work with very tight margins, run farm shops, farmer’s market stalls or independent butchers, so the ability to calculate the real cost of the complexity of processing these animals is limited.

The government needs to step in to make sure we don’t lose any more small slaughterhouses, as we already hardly have one per county.

Easing local business tariffs and introducing subsidies for installing new equipment would be of great help.

A renaissance in artisanal brewing, which continues, was ushered in simple measures such as lowering beer excise tax for microbreweries and providing generous capital grants for equipment purchases.

There is talk of “mobile slaughterhouses” visiting farms and replacing small slaughterhouses, but these have been slow to take off.

It is difficult to see how they would work in practice in terms of ensuring adequate animal welfare and food safety standards.

Even if they could be made to work, mobile facilities would surely only further undermine the small local slaughterhouses that are still trying to make it through.

The ability to have my native exotic breeds of cattle and sheep delivered to a local slaughterhouse to be served in a local pub has become critical to two businesses I run.

But I’m just one of thousands of small meat producers, all of whom have an amazing variety of different and interesting products to sell that will have a very hard time moving on when we lose our few remaining small slaughterhouses.

I gave the full 40 minute lecture to my local MP. I suggest you do the same before it’s too late.