i have just started watching this program and i am a single mum with 2 children on benifits and i have to say not for one second would i go back to the shops and by chicken or eggs from caged hens/chickens. I am honestly thinking of making part of my garden into a chicken run,i just hae to save up to do my garden up 1st but i will its awful how these animals are treated you wouldnt treat a dog like this so whats so different about a chicken yeah we eat them so surley we should treat them alot kinder since we kill them. NO MORE CAGES
I haven't previously thought that much about chicken welfare.
However since watching overweight people harping on about how they can't afford to buy free range blah blah blah, and the cruel conditions that chickens are kept in, I have decided to NEVER again buy anything but free range chicken.
I'm in my mid-30's.... I'm sure when I was about 15 - (20 years ago), a whole chicken was the same price as it is now.
If you do the maths, people are still making a living out of farming chickens, so they must be cutting costs somewhere - so it must be the welfare of poor chickens.
I do shop at Tesco's. I'll be honest, I probably still will - they deliver to my area.
However, I have vowed not to buy any chicken at all from there - from now on I will buy it from my local butcher.
If Tesco's want to continue to sell anything other than free-range chicken I will not boost their chicken sales - sounds small, but if enough people stopped buying any chicken from the main supermarkets, then eventually they would have to reconsider their position. It will be much less convenient for me, but I will do it.
I just find it hard to believe people have no idea about the dreadful conditions animals are kept in by british farmers. I have made it my business to look into it...if you want a further understanding...just type in cruelty to animals in you tube....but be warned..its not for the faint hearted.
can i just say what a sterling job hugh is doing! i have always bought free range chickens and eggs. hopefully people watching the show will change their eating habits and mass chicken production will be outlawed. i would just like to add that Hayley (in the show) should spend less money on getting her nails done and find some ethics!!
Originally posted by freerange: I haven't previously thought that much about chicken welfare.
However since watching overweight people harping on about how they can't afford to buy free range blah blah blah, and the cruel conditions that chickens are kept in, I have decided to NEVER again buy anything but free range chicken.
I'm in my mid-30's.... I'm sure when I was about 15 - (20 years ago), a whole chicken was the same price as it is now.
If you do the maths, people are still making a living out of farming chickens, so they must be cutting costs somewhere - so it must be the welfare of poor chickens.
I do shop at Tesco's. I'll be honest, I probably still will - they deliver to my area.
However, I have vowed not to buy any chicken at all from there - from now on I will buy it from my local butcher.
If Tesco's want to continue to sell anything other than free-range chicken I will not boost their chicken sales - sounds small, but if enough people stopped buying any chicken from the main supermarkets, then eventually they would have to reconsider their position. It will be much less convenient for me, but I will do it.
I agree 100% with this post,it made me chuckle to see as you say the overweight people saying they can't afford to buy free range! I'm not a single parent but we don't have much money and are on a very tight budget. I went shopping yesterday and for the whole week I bought some organic lamb mince which will be enough for two nights and some smoked haddock. On Sunday I will buy a joint from the local butchers. I can't afford to buy meat for every single night of the week, but guess what, we are healthy and not starving!
I prefer to do this rather than support the disgraceful way some animals are farmed. It can only do the animals and ourselves good to eat decent meat even if we can't afford to have meat with every meal - it won't kill us!!
Would any of you like to share your views on Hugh's Chicken Run and the other programmes in Channel 4's Big Food Fight season with the makers of The TV Show, Channel 4’s monthly discussion show about what’s on TV? Would you like the chance to have your views aired on Saturday’s show?
Has Channel 4 succeeded in changing the way you think about food, or just helped to turn your stomach?
If you’d like to get in contact with makers of The TV Show, please email: thetvshow@channel4.com. Tell them I sent you.
The Big Food debate is now the bookie’s favourite for the main debate on The TV Show this Saturday 12 Jan at 4.15pm and we’d like to hear your opinions of this week’s shows: Hugh's Chicken Run (7, 8 & 9 Jan, 9pm), Dispatches: The Truth About Food (10 Jan, 9pm) and Jamie's Fowl Dinners (11 Jan, 9pm).
To keep-up-to-date with what’s coming up in the next programme on Saturday January 12th, please see The TV Show website.
I'm a single mum and my child has special needs and over the last few months money has been really scarce so i have bought the cheepest eggs becouse i have to buy everything cheap, i usually buy free range but after seeing the programme i will go back to free range. It will mean we can't afford to have eggs so often but at least i will know that the chickens have a good life as i have pets of my own and i wouldn't want them to ever suffer. Battery farming should be banned and only good animal care should be accepted. I am forced to get shopping from a supermarket as i don't have a car and for heavy things it is cheaper for me to have it delivered. I buy meat and veg from town that i can carry home as i don't trust the supermarket for things like that.
well done Hugh - I wholeheartedly support what you're doing on Chicken Out - fantastic! The point I'd really like to make however, is that I think there's a much more important target to be aiming at - the battery egg business. I don't buy battery eggs and I don't know how many are now sold but I suspect it's a lot. I also suspect that conditions for battery chickens reared for eggs has not changed very much since I was a teenager in the 70s and worked at a battery farm at weekends. The conditions were truly appalling, really really disgraceful and many times worse than those we've seen on Chicken Out. Those intensive broiler houses are a walk in the park compared with the battery egg environment. Maybe Channel4 can urge Hugh to take some action ...
Many congratulations to Hugh on his success. The fat lady really helped by showing how not to behave - her poor kids growing up with her as an example of a good mother - not! The whole point is that we are diminished as human beings if we allow or encourage cruelty to living creatures. If we know living creatures are kept in vile conditions and yet still buy them and so prolong their misery we are really not only cruel and ignorant, we are sub-human.
We have kept chickens in the back garden for eggs for the last 7 years. If the people in the experiment had kept the hens a bit longer until they laid eggs they would never have killed them as the eggs are super tasty, nutritious and so versatile. You don't need to eat chicken to be healthy and happy. I would be happy to give tips to anyone thinking of keeping free-range chickens in the back garden.
Chicken is a luxury food to our family and a privilage. As a small holder who has chickens, i have never bought into the supermarket cheap poultry or other meats because of the way all mass farming is managed.Surely the public are aware of intense farming but turn a blind eye. demand and supply!And the farmers union is one of the biggest and wealtheist unions!If hugh was to convince evryone who buys cheap chicken to buying free range i would question if the free range farmers could supply the demand. unlikely! and unfortunate! if only we lived in an ideal world.. i would love to see mass changes on how wee veiw our meats and have better welfare for all animals..
Poor Hayley. My sympathies, it must be hard surviving on the cusp of starvation on cheap chickens. What is it at the moment, 3 programmes on the trot last night some of us witnessed televised death for our furry and feathery friends! In our sanitised world its no wonder some slow down to look at car accidents eh? Can we do a programme on those poor office workers who are holed up in a booth - fed rubbish, made to stare at screens all day, chirp on about nothing down a phone for a subsistence existence, that then come home and watch a load of chickens in a barn on a box,Oh the Irony. come on Hugh yer the man..
Cheers an keep it up Hugh/Jamie/Staff it is appreciated.
Originally posted by casumptious: Chicken is a luxury food to our family and a privilage. As a small holder who has chickens, i have never bought into the supermarket cheap poultry or other meats because of the way all mass farming is managed.Surely the public are aware of intense farming but turn a blind eye. demand and supply!And the farmers union is one of the biggest and wealtheist unions!If hugh was to convince evryone who buys chicken to buying free range i would question if the free range farmers could supply the demand. unlikely! and unfortunate! if only we lived in an ideal world.. i would love to see mass changes on how wee veiw our meats and have better welfare for all animals..
I am so pleased to see people reacting so well to this. i have struggled to get people to watch it!! I dont understand why people find it so hard to watch a chicken going through a cycle of life and death and on to thier plates when its because of them its happening. If you dont like seeing an animal being killed then don't eat it!! I keep chickens in my garden and its wonderful. They are happy and they reward us with eggs! I couldn't care less wether your on benefits. Everyone can afford what they can afford but nothing has to suffer because of it. We cant afford to buy a chicken every week but that's how its always been. Its only recent that chickens have become so cheap!!! If you are on benefits then don't smoke, cut back on drink, stop buying so much rubbish for each other at christmas and spend money where it is supposed to be spent. For our childrens sake we have to teach them about food and the whole cycle. respecting food comes from our parents. Grow your own veg too. you only need a windowsill and you could grow insane amounts of lettuce or beans or peas, a balcony will give you a sack of potatoes, strawberries. eating these chickens is a disgrace to our human nature!!! chav's get off your high horse and stop whining about your bloody benefits. You can afford more than most of us, buy free range!!
How ridiculous to put the blame on folk on low incomes or benefits!!quoted above.And as for Hayley perhaps she is being made to look a certain way to the veiwer that is not fair hence the unfair comments and silly name calling about her being fat.. shows the mentality of some veiwers and forum typers!! plenty of afluente and privilaged wealthy folk buy cheap chicken!!!no one has an excuse.. after given thought to hughs programe last night i feel he ought to be targeting the governmant and farmers uninion and other bodies involved in intense farming of chickens as he targeted the public and supermarkets.ONLY THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG!!! As for making this a national campagne, that would be intresting KFC and other large fast food companies eh? wonder if hugh also would like to make a programe on how pate is produced!? too...
I thought Hugh's programme was excellent. People need educating about where the food on their plates actually comes from. Supermarkets treat their customers as idiots and don't want to give them the choice. Buying Free-range has got nothing to do with the amount of income you have either. Plenty of people who live off benefits still manage to drink, smoke, drive and watch Sky TV, so what is an extra couple of pounds to pay for a chicken that's had a proper life? I always buy free-range eggs and chickens and will never, ever buy standard produced goods. Well done Hugh, keep on with the campaign.
I am so glad that I watched Chicken Out this week. I had already started buying free range organic eggs but now will never again buy anything other than free range chicken! I wish that everyone could have seen the programme, I'm sure many more would be converted. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has done an excellent job of bringing this to the attention of so many and with more help the message could be spread further. I noticed last night that many of those critising him and saying that they could not afford to buy free range were in what appeared to be a pub. Were they drinking tap water then because presumably they can't afford alchohol?
Originally posted by NickF60: well done Hugh - I wholeheartedly support what you're doing on Chicken Out - fantastic! The point I'd really like to make however, is that I think there's a much more important target to be aiming at - the battery egg business. I don't buy battery eggs and I don't know how many are now sold but I suspect it's a lot. I also suspect that conditions for battery chickens reared for eggs has not changed very much since I was a teenager in the 70s and worked at a battery farm at weekends. The conditions were truly appalling, really really disgraceful and many times worse than those we've seen on Chicken Out. Those intensive broiler houses are a walk in the park compared with the battery egg environment. Maybe Channel4 can urge Hugh to take some action ...
Well said Nick, i was thinking exactly the same myself. Take a look at the 1954 Protection of Birds Act, it states that it is an offence to keep any bird in a cage or other receplacle which is not of sufficient size to permit the bird to stretch its wings freely in all directions. This Act excludes poultry !!! Since when has a chicken not been a bird ? If you thought that hugh's chickens were kept in squalid conditions, check out a battery system.
I just wanted to say well done to channel 4 & Hugh - these were excellent programmes and I for one will certainly only buy free range poultry from now on! We all know this goes on but seeing it up close really bought home what a sad life these chickens have. Well done all involved.
Hi there, I would like to add my thanks to Hugh and Channel 4 for broadcasting this programme. For many years I have not bought anything but free range meat and eggs. I cannot believe how some of the locals were treating Hugh as if he was 'the enemy'; the supermarkets are the enemy and in a way are run like battery/intensive farms, packing in as many punters as they can manage. I would never buy any meat from them of any description as they are not at all interested in the welfare of animals, only profit....Tescos being one of the worst. Those people who complain about the cost of free range should perhaps also understand that cheap chickens include more fat and also contain more water, and so you are not getting as good a deal as you think. I don't know if Jamies prog on Friday will include any reference to this, but there is an excellent chariety called the Battery Hen Welfare Trust who rescue battery hens from farms before they are slaughtered and try and get them re-homed; I have a few of them and keeping hens and re-habilitating them is so rewarding. Let me know if anyone wants the details of their website.
sorry to go on but this is one of my hobbie horses!
I have watched the Hugh's programmes with great interest being part of Axminster's community as Town Crier of the town. Yes, the treatment of chickens is extremely cruel,99% of people are agreed on that.From where I am standing I think that the vast majority of the viewers who have watched the programmes will now go away, think about whether to buy free range chicken for about 5 minutes and then go and do what they have been doing before Hugh brought these issues to the nations attention..that is buy the 2 for £5 chickens from Tesco.FACT. It will take more than Hugh to change the habits of a lifetime. FACT. but he has made a start and to borrow a well worn cliche from Tesco "EVERY LITTLE HELPS".I wish everyone involved in the Chicken out campaign a lot of luck. Now they are going to have to Up the Ante in order to achieve the success they deserve.
Some of the Axminster community have given him bad press, some of it undeserved but he has made people sit up and take notice of this important issue and for sure he will not lie down and let it drop because that is the nature of the man. For me personally, the jury is out at the moment.We live in a Democratic Society and ultimately,it will be the public who will decide by voting with their feet or not as the case may be.It will be interesting to see what happens during the next 12 months
We, the people have the power to change things. VOTE WITH YOUR POCKETS. It really is the only thing supermarkets will listen to. I am sure that the supermarkets would prefer to only sell free range chickens - because they are more expensive - they can make more profit. the only thing stopping them is that WE the consumer don't by them. It should, in this day and age, in this amazing country not be allowed that animals are treated this way. if I kept chckens in my garden and treated them badley, or had a dog that I had pumped with drugs to make grow too quick so that it had to sit in its own waste, to the point where its legs were burnt, the RSPCA would be down on me like a tonne of bricks, quite rightly. So, why the hell is this treatment allowed??
Peoples priorities have simply changed. Where, 20 years ago, people bought food and payed their bills and, maybe a telly, or clothes, if they had anything left over. These days, their material things are the priority and food is not as much.
As for this "single mum being hard up" buisness. It is total rubbish. The amount of women I know who say they can't afford it before lighting up a fag. £5 a day fags are - that's £35 a week - £1820 per year, but they can't afford a few extra quid on a better quality chicken for thier children. I don't mean to suggest that all single mums smoke - of course not. I simply mean it's about priorites.
people are also lazy. For my family, a chicken can make, sometimes, four days meals. : a sunday roast, next day a curry, next day a chicken stew and some left over for sandwiches. If you think about it that way, £8 on a free range chicken and half a bad price.
Lets also remember that only 10 years ago, free range eggs were seen as expensive and took up hardly any space in the supermarket. Today, battery eggs take up much less. But, do we have to wait for another salmonella before we make the switch.
It is important too, to buy British. There is much about fair trade for farmers in third world countries, yet our own farmers are manipulated and bullied in to not recieving a fair price for thier stock.
phew. that's that off my chest! Thanks Hugh for a fantastic programme. Lets hope we see some change in attitude from the Britsh public soon!!
