Having complained on here last year about the lack of attention given to animal welfare in British politics, I should give credit where due and discuss the animal welfare strategy released by the government last month. In this post, I’ll give my views on the policies in the document, with a separate post to follow on the political implications.
My favourite thing about the animal welfare strategy is that it exists. Labour talked a big game before the last election, promising the “biggest boost in animal welfare for a generation”, but immediately backed off a pledge to ban imports of fois gras (announced during the campaign but mysteriously absent from the party’s manifesto). In power, one of the government’s first acts on animal welfare was to legalise handling chickens by their legs. So while the government spent much of 2025 building expectations for the strategy, I had some worries about how substantial it would be, especially on farmed animals. That was unduly pessimistic: the strategy represents a big public commitment to animal welfare, full of lines and ambitions that can be quoted back at the government. It conspicuously marks the issue out as a priority worthy of time and political capital.
Here’s my colleague Lewis Bollard’s assessment of the most significant measures in terms of the number of animals affected1:
1. Phase out cages for hens: ~7M caged at any time
2. End the debeaking of layer hens: ~50M/year
3. Require humane slaughter for farmed fish: ~45M/year
4. Phase out farrowing crates for pigs: ~30K crated at any time
5. Ban boiling lobsters and crabs alive: >20M/year
6. End the use of CO₂ to stun pigs: ~9M/year2
The scale of farming is always mind blowing, and if these proposals come into force, they will improve the lives and deaths of hundreds of millions of animals. While a lot of the rhetoric and discussion around the strategy has focused on pets and hunting, it is encouraging that the first practical policy out of the gate is perhaps the most impactful - a consultation has already been launched on banning cage systems for laying hens (starting with ‘battery’ cages next year, and phasing out any cages by 2032). However, that also means the job is not yet done - the timing and consultation process create significant opportunity to pressure and derail the government, as we have seen with previous animal welfare measures.
The same goes for the proposal on banning farrowing crates (metal enclosures in which pigs are kept after giving birth), as well as plans to outlaw the stunning of pigs with carbon dioxide, a practice the government’s advisory Animal Welfare Committee believes causes so much suffering that it should be prohibited as soon as possible. That, too, is subject to consultation - which presumably will focus on the question of whether it is good for the UK to be an international pioneer on this question, or bad for it to be an “outlier”.
Another area where the country could show international leadership is fish slaughter, where - anomalously - there are currently no mandatory regulations (unlike Norway). Quietly, the strategy contains a number of policies to help the sorts of animals too often overlooked. The move to ban boiling crabs and lobsters alive is a welcome clarification of the law, building on the previous government’s legal recognition of their sentience. Less specific, but highly encouraging, is the strategy’s stated desire “ensure that wild animals are treated with respect, as other animals are”. In the strategy this is linked to restrictions on hunting and snare traps, but it should also offer succour to groups like the new Center for Wild Animal Welfare looking to identify and promote effective ways to limit harm to wild animals, for example through fertility control and use of pesticides.
Unfortunately, the strategy is weaker when it comes to the 1.1 billion meat chickens reared and slaughtered for meat each year, who experience the worst conditions of any farmed animals. That is a significant oversight, though the government does say it will continue to encourage the industry to sign up to the ‘Better Chicken Commitment’, under which producers agree to reduce crowding, guarantee natural light and to avoid the use of ‘frankenchicken’ breeds that cause suffering.
The approach on broiler chickens reflects a broader pattern, with many measures reliant on the cooperation and goodwill of the agriculture sector. The consultations on hen cages and farrowing crates are framed as “working with industry”, though we shall see whether they can be passed without lapsing into adversarialism. The strategy also laments the 40-45 million male day old chicks needlessly culled because they can’t lay eggs, despite technology existing to identify their sex in egg and avoid them being born just to be killed. But the government’s position is not to do anything about this, beyond asking the industry nicely to stop. The strategy uses slightly stronger language on beak trimming (cutting the tips of hens’ beaks off to stop them pecking each other because they are so distressed by their conditions), vowing to “end the practice”. Again, though, this is to be achieved by “working with the laying hen sector”.
The government’s preference for a voluntary approach as far as possible is understandable: having spent much of its time in office rowing with farmers over inheritance tax, I can see why they are treading carefully. Equally, having antagonised the sector so much already, there is a case for the government to go in for a penny, in for a pound. But I think it goes deeper. This version of the Labour Party, since even before it came to power, has exhibited a strong capacity for wishful thinking, an ability to convince itself that it doesn’t have to make trade-offs, and that the politically expedient action is also the right policy. The animal welfare strategy is full of sentences like these ones, suggesting all the government’s goals are actually aligned and all its stakeholders actually agree, saving it the painful necessity of choosing between them:
For farmed animals, high welfare is linked to improved animal health which in turn can drive improved productivity and lower input costs.
Good animal health and welfare is linked to better farm business management, which supports the government’s growth mission
I am less confident than the government that farming is likely to be a driver of growth, that more efficient farming is likely to be good for animals, and that farmers will do the right thing without compulsion. At this stage, I am not confident what happens if the government feels it needs to pick between its objectives, or upset a particular set of stakeholders, which is worrying given how confrontational the various consultation processes could get.
The biggest disappointment of the strategy, in my view, is the failure to reach a decision on method of production labelling. The previous Conservative government set out quite radical proposals for a five tier welfare labelling scheme on pork, chicken and egg products. This government is clearly reluctant to go that far, but having completed one consultation on the question (in which 99% of respondents backed mandatory labelling), it has kicked the can further down the road. The new animal welfare strategy doesn’t close the door on labelling reform, but commits to “work with relevant stakeholders, including farming and food industry stakeholders, vets, scientists and animal welfare NGOs to continue exploring how improved food labelling, including method-of-production labelling, could improve animal welfare”. This is a pity because the labelling scheme would not just inform consumers, and strengthen the market position of producers with higher standards, but would also be a valuable source of information on the state of welfare within the food system.
Another issue many, including the National Farmers’ Union, have highlighted is the failure of the strategy to prevent low welfare imports undercutting British produce. This is tricky (though not necessarily impossible) to address within the constraints of trade law. However, it is worth noting that the proposed labelling reforms would highlight lower standards from imports. The government’s impact assessment estimated that British farmers would be £47 million a year better off under the changes.
From a personal perspective, I was pleased to see the government focus on enforcement of welfare laws, an issue I have previously written about. In particular, it is positive that the government committed to “reduce the prevalence of pig tail docking” - which ought to be a signal to enforcement authorities to clamp down on a practice that is legally not supposed to be routinely used, but is applied in three-quarters of cases. The strategy acknowledged the Animal Sentience Committee’s recent report on enforcement, whose recommendations overlapped significantly with my own. The promise to publish more information on enforcement activity is the most promising move here. Regularly having to admit things like the fact that only 2% of breaches are prosecuted may shame authorities into action. However, a fuller response to enforcement would have clarified responsibilities for enforcement, provided more resources and strengthened powers.
The more time I’ve spent looking at British farmed animal welfare policy, the more frustrated I have been by the glib complacency of people who assert that the country has some of the highest standards in the world. The welfare strategy is more modest in its rhetoric, acknowledging the reality that “Although the UK is at the forefront of some animal welfare standards, we risk falling behind some countries in other areas”. At the same time, some of the proposals - particularly on fish slaughter and pig stunning - would genuinely put the UK at the frontier of animal welfare regulation. However, that requires them to be passed: the key question is whether the government has the time, patience, goodwill and resolve to do the fine things it has proposed.
Coefficient Giving, the organisation I work for, does a lot on animal welfare, led by Lewis. However, I am not myself involved in that work, and this post - like all my others - reflects only my personal views, not those of the institution.
I make no apology for focusing on farmed and wild animals, rather than domestic pets, given the numbers and levels of suffering at stake.
Thanks for this Aveek!
Do you happen to know what might constitute humane slaughter for farmed fish? Does the government have the technical assistance it needs from animal advocates? Do you happen to know what would replace CO2 gassing of pigs and how that compares from a welfare perspective?
[no expectation that you should be across these details, just asking in case you happen to be :)]