Animal Aid

Vote 'No' for Jockey McCoy as Sports Personality of the Year

BBC Television routinely downplayed the deaths of horses during racing events that it broadcast, so it is no surprise that it has once again shortlisted jockey AP McCoy for Sports Personality of the Year, despite the large number of horses who have died under him on racecourses.

Animal Aid's Christmas Fayre 2013 – Don't miss out!

Sunday 8th December 2013, Kensington Town Hall, Hornton Street, London, W8 from 10am until 5pm. Entry £2, under 11s free.

With more than 95 stalls promoting ethical living and cruelty-free products, inspiring talks, vegan cafés, childrens activities and much more, the Animal Aid Christmas Fayre 2013 is the event of the year, so don’t miss it!

The badger cull is abandoned!

Just days after Brian May’s legal challenge to halt the cull in Gloucestershire was denied by the High Court, comes news that the government has abandoned the cull. Marksmen have failed to kill enough animals to meet even the drastically reduced targets.

The badger cull policy has been a spectacular failure. Whether Owen Paterson will continue with his unscientific, unpopular and misguided plans to roll out the badger cull next year remains unclear at this time.

Progress on CCTV in Labs

In May last year, Animal Aid – together with the National Anti-Vivisection Society – submitted to the head of the Home Office (HO) unit that authorises and regulates animal experiments a dossier making the case for the compulsory introduction of CCTV cameras in research laboratories.

This was followed up with the submission of further dossiers of evidence and meetings with the senior HO officials. Finally, there is progress.

MRSA Outbreak in UK turkeys

A strain of the MRSA bacterium – which is resistant to a range of antibiotics – has been identified in turkeys being prepared for Christmas at a farm in East Anglia. However, it seems the situation is being down-played by the government, possibly to protect business interests during the festive period, which is critical for the financial health of the turkey industry.

High Court Action filed today by Brian May's Save Me Organisation

The controversial badger cull extension presently underway in the South West of England faces a new legal challenge with a High Court action filed today (26th Nov) by Brian May’s Save Me organisation.

Take Action on Foie Gras

Foie gras production is illegal in the UK and causes immense suffering to geese. A PETA campaign asks us all to take action by urging Fortnum & Mason to be stripped of its Royal Warrant as long as it sells this "torture in a tin".

Princess Anne and the horsemeat debate

Princess Anne’s recent comments that we should consider a trade in horsemeat have sparked heated debate.

The implication is that by treating horses in the same way as other animals bred and slaughtered for meat, their welfare would be markedly improved, and cases of neglected or abandoned horses would decrease.

Lush Prize recognises outstanding work on non-animal testing

The winners of the 2013 Lush Prize have shared prize money of £250,000 for their pioneering work on non-animal chemical safety testing at an award ceremony in London on 13 November. Andrew Tyler, Director of Animal Aid, was one of the judges and presented the awards for the lobbying category.

The dozen winners from Europe, the USA and New Zealand were rewarded for their outstanding contributions in the field of cruelty-free scientific research, public awareness raising and lobbying.

Council rejects application for vivisection breeding unit

Councillors have rejected a planning application for a new vivisection breeding unit in East Yorkshire. The unit would have bred dogs and ferrets for use in animal experiments and been an expansion of B&K Universal, a company that supplies animals to laboratories. This is the second time permission has been refused, as a similar, larger-scale application was submitted last year but not granted permission to go ahead.

Animal Aid would like to thank the councillors who voted against the application, and all the campaigners who have worked tirelessly to raise awareness of the scientific – as well as ethical – arguments against the use of animals in experiments. The petition against the application gained 40,644 signatures, demonstrating the strength of public opposition to the cruel and outdated practice of vivisection.

Wall Street Journal writes about campaign to protect Britain's monk parakeets

An article in the Wall Street Journal details the campaign to protect the feral population of monk parakeets living in the UK. The government has spent £192,000 trying to capture and kill the birds, whose numbers were thought to be no more than 87. Animal Aid works with local campaigners to protect these birds and lobbies for an end to their persecution.

Animals in war: victims not heroes

November 11 is Remembrance Day, when we are asked to consider the cost of war and remember its victims. Until recent years, the suffering of animals as a consequence of human conflict attracted scant consideration. Certainly, it has rarely received the kind of systematic analysis to be found in the pages of an important new book, called Animals and War: Confronting the Military-Animal Industrial Complex. It is due to be published in January by Lexington Press, and has a preface written by Animal Aid Director Andrew Tyler. You can read that preface via the link below. No matter how many medals are handed out, the millions of animals destroyed by warring human beings, Andrew notes, are not heroes they are victims. And they do not volunteer their lives; their lives are taken from them.

(Please note: We are unable to fulfil further orders this year for purple poppies.)

As racing prepares to celebrate its most successful jockey ever…

Animal Aid reveals McCoy’s record 25 horse deaths in just six years

As celebrity jockey AP McCoy approaches a landmark total of 4,000 wins in a career spanning more than 20 years, the unpalatable truth omitted from the growing hype is the shocking number of horses who have died under him on racecourses.

Public subsidies paid to millionaire grouse shooters

As millions of Britons continue to suffer economic hard times, Animal Aid this week demands an end to public subsidies for millionaire grouse shoot owners.

Shoot operators in England, Scotland and Wales – whose well-heeled clients can each pay more than £3,000 for a single day’s shooting – receive millions of pounds annually from the taxpayer. The money is claimed for the maintenance and restoration of their shooting grounds.

Veal Production in the UK: Another reason to take the Great Vegan Challenge!

Dairy cows are made pregnant so that they produce commercial quantities of milk. Female calves may join the herd as replacements for their worn-out mothers who are ‘culled’. The males – and some of the females, too – may be reared for veal or for beef. Unwanted males will simply be shot at birth.

In recent weeks, Animal Aid has visited three veal farms in the UK.

Culling Badgers Spreads TB

Scientists at the University of Exeter have studied badgers to see how their social interaction may spread bovine TB. They found that TB-infected badgers tended to be shunned within their social groups and were more isolated than uninfected badgers. This confines the disease. However, culling disrupts this stability, and infected badgers disperse, spreading the disease further. The study found that vaccination did not cause this ‘perturbation’ effect.

Horsemeat scandal: The Guardian’s revelations

The Guardian’s Felicity Lawrence has conducted a thorough and eye-opening investigation into the horsemeat scandal, which has uncovered a ‘labyrinth of murky meat brokerage that stretches across borders and takes in drug and horse smuggling, animal welfare abuses, and one of Europe's richest beef tycoons’.

If you are shocked by the treatment of horses in abattoirs, please remember that all animals sent to slaughter have a terrifying and gruesome end. If you don’t want to fund the meat and slaughter trade, why not take the Great Vegan Challenge this November?

Urgent action needed to stop new vivisection breeding unit!

We have less than a week to stop a facility from being built that would breed dogs and ferrets to be used in animal experiments. Last year, campaigners stopped a similar application from being accepted, but a scaled-down version has now been submitted to East Riding of Yorkshire Council for a unit to be built on the same site.

Stop Vivisection: Signatures urgently needed

Time is running out for the Stop Vivisection petition and more signatures are urgently needed. If the petition collects one million signatures by 1 November, and has been signed by a minimum number of people in at least seven EU countries, there will be the opportunity to call for a new European directive that would end experiments on animals in the EU. The big push is on across the EU to ensure we pass the magic 1 million figure – we're getting close. The total today (15 October) is 877,000. Every vote counts, please sign online today.

Innocent birds killed for fun

Please sign our petition asking WHSmith to ban the sale of violent pro-shooting magazines to under-18s – and remember to share it on Facebook and Twitter and to encourage your friends to do the same.

The strength of this campaign is that it takes us to the core ethical issue of ‘killing animals for pleasure’. Pro-shooting magazines attempt to normalize this sordid and unacceptable activity, and serve as propaganda for the gun lobby’s drive to encourage more children to take up this ‘sport’.

The badgers are moving the goalposts

Today, Defra Minister Owen Paterson declared the trial badger cull in Somerset successful, but only because the official estimate of badger numbers was sharply reduced in the last few days.

Badger Cull Latest

Two worrying news stories have emerged this week: the first is that the government appears to be moving towards sanctioning the gassing of badger setts; the second is that a licensed badger shooter left a box of live ammunition lying on a public footpath.

The Great Vegan Challenge 2013

This November sees the return of the Great Vegan Challenge. Last year 800 people pledged to give up animal products for the whole month and the response from them was overwhelmingly positive. Why not give it a try and see how going vegan can change your life, and the lives of animals, for the better?

Be Kind – Don't Kill

As cold weather approaches, wild animals may search for warmth and sustenance within our homes. And, if they can get easy access and find sufficient food for the winter months, who could blame them? If you find a squirrel in your attic or a mouse in your kitchen please don’t panic and call in ‘pest’ controllers. The traps and poisons they use can cause prolonged agony to animals and do nothing to solve the underlying reasons why that animal moved in. Instead, take a few practical steps to encourage that animal to move on.