Tory plan to force farmers to send livestock to nearest abattoir branded ‘nonsense’

“When we are ready, we have said we want to strengthen restrictions, but we have not set out the full details of that and anything which was done would be subject to a full consultation.”

Chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee Neil Parish, who joined Mr Eustice on the panel at the event, also criticised the plan and pointed out the slaughter industry was dominated by a few big players.

He said: “If we are going to go down this route, the retailers cannot demand one slaughterhouse for all their stock, and we are going to have to have some more slaughterhouses.

Devil

“If we are going to have everything slaughtered locally, where the devil are we going to do it?

“This thing has got to be thought through. I am not saying it is the wrong policy, but you cannot just suddenly say ‘you must slaughter locally’.”

Mr Bonner said the policy would not do anything to improve welfare, but was assumed to be ‘wonderful for voters’.

“Personally, I think it is nonsense,” he added.