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Workers at dairy farms supplying yoghurt giant Muller and Marks & Spencer hit cows with poles, kicked them and yelled abuse at them, undercover footage has revealed.
One employee – at an M&S poster farm for animal welfare standards – ran at a cow, angrily shouting “You’re f***ing r*****ed,” then appeared to jab her with a sharp object.
The footage, taken at a milk producer with RSPCA Assured endorsement that supplies both M&S and Muller, also shows a tractor being driven at speed at cows to force them to run away.
M&S said it immediately suspended the farm after being shown the footage while it investigated, and it’s understood a worker elsewhere was sacked after The Independent showed Muller the video clips. The RSPCA also suspended the farm after seeing the video.
Both M&S and Muller said they set high standards of animal welfare that they expected suppliers to follow.
But activist Joey Carbstrong, who secretly put the cameras in place, claimed the video clips showed that cows in the dairy industry were routinely abused when workers thought they were not being watched.
In a series of scenes of violence at two UK farms, workers were seen repeatedly hitting cows with metal chains and poles, kicking them and shouting offensive language at them.
Early sections of the video, taken in 2022 at a farm that M&S has previously featured in its advertising, claiming it promotes high animal welfare, appear to show a worker angrily running after a cow and swearing before he pulls a screwdriver or another tool from his pocket and jabs it into the cow’s side.
In two separate instances, workers use a pole or broom to hit penned cows on their spines. One animal slips while trying to escape.
Footage from this year shows workers shouting at cows, “You f***ing deaf?” and “I’m f***ing warning you” while hitting their backs with poles.
The floor of the large shed appears covered in excrement, and when one animal slips a worker calls out, “You f***ing b***h” and runs towards it, making the cow run to try to escape. Mr Carbstrong said it seemed clear the cows had learnt to be afraid of him.
A worker repeats, “You f***ing b***h” as he kicks, slaps and knees a cow to make her stand.
A 2022 M&S press release said that “Select farmers” such as this one ensured dairy cows were “cared for to the highest animal welfare standards”.
The farm has an M&S contract through Muller.
In response to the footage, an M&S spokesperson said: “We take animal welfare extremely seriously and set rigorous standards for our suppliers. This footage shows behaviour that falls well below those standards, which our customers rightly expect us to uphold, so we have immediately suspended the farm from our supply chain whilst we and RSPCA Assured urgently investigate.”
At a different farm supplying Muller, the footage, taken between 2022 and this year, appears to show:
- A worker constantly hitting a cow with a long-handled implement and kicking it, trying to get it to move
- A worker slapping a calf in the face hard, saying: “F*** off”
- A worker hitting a cow with what looks like thick rope
- A man slapping, kneeing and pushing a cow
- At least 10 other instances of workers punching cows, kneeing them or hitting them with chains – including once on the head or in the face
At one point, a worker drags a calf while two cows follow, one thought to be the mother. The worker kicks out at the mother before dragging the calf through a gate while the mother runs to the gate and cries out.
Since the footage was shot, an independent Red Tractor inspection of the farm was carried out and found no animal welfare concerns.
But Mr Carbstrong said: “Our latest investigation exposes the facade behind the RSPCA’s Assured label, which is meaningless in protecting animals.
“The dairy industry views sentient animals as machines to be exploited until exhaustion for profit, then slaughtered. It’s no wonder these sensitive, curious beings are also systematically abused when the workers think no one is watching.”
A spokesperson for Muller Milk & Ingredients said: “This upsetting and unacceptable behaviour is in no way representative of the high health and welfare standards we require from our supplying farms.
“We do not tolerate animal cruelty or poor welfare conditions on any of our supplying farms, and we work closely with suppliers to ensure our strict standards are adhered to and regular Red Tractor Dairy assurance scheme checks are carried out.
“We are conducting a full investigation and have taken immediate action to identify the individuals featured in the footage, and appropriate measures will be taken.”
An RSPCA Assured spokesperson said: “The behaviour shown in this footage falls significantly below the high standards we demand of RSPCA Assured members, and it is completely unacceptable for any animal to be treated in this way.
“We launched an urgent investigation as soon as we were made aware of the footage. One of the two farms shown in the footage is not an RSPCA Assured member. The other farm has been suspended from the scheme pending further investigation. This means they cannot currently market or sell any products under the RSPCA Assured label.”
They said they had reported the footage to the Animal and Plant Health Agency, adding: “Animal welfare is our absolute priority and we always take any complaints of poor welfare extremely seriously.
“We urge anyone with any concerns about the welfare of animals on an RSPCA Assured certified farm to contact us straight away, without delay, so that we can immediately investigate and address any welfare issues as a priority.”
