Urgent Action: Tell Defra Not to Let Chickens Down!

Don't let the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) weaken UK law protecting chickens.

Imagine suddenly being grabbed by the legs and flipped upside down. The world spins as you dangle helplessly, confused as your heart races in fear and the pain of your leg bones fracturing grips your body. Defra plans to make this way of catching chickens on UK farms before they're thrown into crates and sent to slaughter lawful – which contradicts EU law, weakens UK law, and will cause these sensitive animals even more suffering.

Please urge Defra to drop these cruel plans.

This would mark the first move away from provisions in EU law that weakens protections for animals on farms. Steve Reed, secretary of state for Defra, promised that the Labour Party would introduce the biggest boost in animal welfare in a generation, but making it lawful to catch chickens in this way would be the opposite. Once again, profit is being prioritised over animal welfare.

Chickens used for eggs are kept alive until they're no longer profitable. At around 18 months old, they are killed en masse: tens of thousands of them are roughly grabbed and chucked into trays, loaded onto lorries, and sent to a slaughterhouse.

Chickens killed for their flesh live only around 42 days, by which time many are immobile, unable to stand due to the crushing weight of their own – unnaturally large – body. Please spare chickens a miserable life and a terrifying death by never eating birds or their eggs.

The very least Defra can do for these sensitive individuals is spare them additional stress and injury before they're killed. It must not make catching them by the legs and flipping them upside down part of UK law.

Please sign and send an urgent message to the secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs telling him to reverse this cruel decision.