Nicholas Belfitt shares this news from the Liberal Democrats Intogether campaign. Ed
The Isle of Wight Liberal Democrat party has criticised the Isle of Wight Conservative MP, Andrew Turner’s comments this week as inaccurate and misleading. The MP’s comments suggested that being part of the EU would lead to the damaging of animal rights through the exportation rules on life stock.
EU regulation protects livestock
The Liberal Democrats Intogether campaign however responded that the MP‘s comments were inaccurate and that the EU had a standing history of regulation that protected livestock in both farming and transportation.
Nicholas Belfitt, Leader of IOW Intogether said,
“The Liberal Democrats have had a history of supporting animal welfare in both farming and wildlife. A study by Animal Aid, a national animal campaign group, showed we have the biggest support of animal welfare of all the main parties.
“Mr Turner’s comments here however are inaccurate. We only have to look at the regulation in the Council Regulation (European Commission Directives) on the protection of animals during transportation and related operations that show Mr Turner is not correct in his assumptions that the exportation of live animals will get worse if the UK remains in the EU. There are over 2,000 EU regulations safe guarding live animal transportation rights which is summarised by the EU Council’s 1st Directive in which it states: ‘No person shall transport animals or cause animals to be transported in a way that is likely to cause injury or undue suffering to them’. This shows that there is plenty of regulation to allow animals to be exported to slaughter safely and humanly.
“Mr Turner’s comments make it sound that UK farmers will be forced to export live animals under inhumane conditions, as if this is the only exportation allowed, but there is nothing stopping UK farmers or firms from transporting already slaughtered meat to the single market instead.”
National Pro-EU Intogether campaign
The IOW Liberal Democrats have also been out this weekend in Ryde leafleting as part of the wider National Pro-EU Intogether campaign that the Lib Dem launched across the country on Saturday.
Nicholas also added,
“We are doing the best we can to make sure people are informed with the arguments with sources, facts and figures. We believe that staying in the EU is best for Britain. We believe the argument has to be won on the door step and that is how we are proceeding.”
Image: claveirole under CC BY 2.0
