Suggest you start a religion, devise a 'uniform', declare a specific method of dispatching your home-reared livestock as a basic tenet of your religious rules...... and go ahead and do it.

After all, that's what all the other non-Christian religions do so that they can enjoy meat killed in their own way within the UK.

Your www.thislittlepiggystayedathome.com website is not working. Perhaps you should start a www.based petition on the uk.gov site provided for that purpose and see how many people sign it?

C. Arey, Sittingbourne, Kent

Our army of highly paid beaurocrats ought to give up their safe jobs and help to create the Nation's wealth rather than spending it on dreaming up and administering ridiculas regulations like this!

John Spence, Guildford, Surrey

As a chef and a gourmet, i totally agree with the slaughter at home of animals, be them pigs, cows or sheep. I also believe the meat tastes better becasue of the environment the animal has grown in, although the lack of adrenaline in the system can make a difference to the tenderness of the meat.

And can you see a shiny suited, jobsworth going to see Mario in Italy about this, or anyone in France, Spain, or any of the other countries of Europe who have a healthy (in both senses of the word) home slaughter 'market'? Well done England, for letting some faceless beaurocrat dictate to us what we cannot do.

When did the UK lose it's backbone???

Duncan Adkinson, Colchester, Essex

My undertanding is that if you are a "farmer" with an agricultural holding number, you can slaughter your own pig at your farm / home where it can be eaten by all members of of your family who reside there. However if you had a bed and breakfast guest, who paid for his dinner with you, it would be illegal to serve the same pork to him!

I took advice on where the law stood, if I chose to feed the same pork to my guests who paid nothing to attend the party at which it was served. Apparently this would beccome a test case in the courts!

Margot Kennedy, Aberdeen, Scotland

So it is legal for you to try to kill the animal but in doing so possible botch the process inflicting immense suffering to the pig but illegal to get in a professional, expert slaughterman in ... barking.

PS The URL doesn't seem to exist ....

Pyers Symon, Worcester ,

Its more a case of the rest of Europe seeing these restrictive laws as guidelines,to be adopted or not. Britain seems to be alone in taking them as rote,and in many cases making them even more draconian

Mike Lever, Salford, Great Britain

Surely the easist way around this stupid law is simply to state it a Christian custom and as such is protected by our Christiuan rights. You may have read the similar article reported last year were a Muslum had slaughtered a sheep in the street despite neighbours protests. When reported to the police their response - Oh that's a religious matter, Halal meat, and as such not much we can do?
The other point I raise in support of Home killing. Jamie Olivers excellant Italian food progamne last year clearly illustrates how we conduct our selves within the EU and how other other members do. The Italians are certainly not going to change their food heritage because some law from Brussels says so, and why should they. They have superb pork products , as we used to,and do they have rampant Salmanella or any other food nasty from the way they slaughter ,certainly not. Support Home slaughter, review and challenge Environmental officials powers otherwise 1984 and all that!.

A Watson, Buckingham, uk

You should read http://www.food.gov.uk/multimedia/pdfs/privatekillguidance2006.pdf
The law is not100% clear although the FAQ say it is the body of the text states
Slaughter on-farm by an itinerant slaughterman
16. It is unlawful for a farmer to use the services of an itinerant slaughterman both to kill his animal and to dress it. If however, the slaughterman did no more than
kill the animal for the farmer, leaving the farmer to dress and cut the carcase, the Courts might be less likely to conclude that the slaughterman was supplying goods (and more
likely to be supplying services). If so, this activity might be held to be lawful. Take a test case - let the court decide!!

Kate Holme, Fordingbridge, UK

How ironic that the video showing mindless rednecks shoving spent dairy cows into the burger factory with a forklift truck should appear on the same page as your article.
It is unfortunate that the cardboard cut-out from Defra probably did not see this nauseating clip before darkening your door - it may not have prevented the censure but would cetainly have provided some (unpalatable) food for thought.
I concede that permitting the general public to slaughter their own beasts would be a too big a step (I have witnessed the Seker Bayram sacrifice in Turkey where every joe wheels down to the supermarket car park with a rusty shank in order to participate in the amateur butchery) but surely Mary Kennedy's proposal of licensed itinerant slaughtermen is feasible, even with the raft of inevitable documentation and regulation.

Julian Bruce, Dubai, UAE

Although I am vegetarian I agree that your pigs have the right to die happy and stress free.
Gillian Denty Bristol

gillian denty, bristol,

How are you killing the Pigs? Please share that with us first, before we can come to any conclusion about your 'superior' method. As a Vegetarian, this is not an issue for me directly. But you do have to take into account that not everybody who 'would' slaughter at home, would know what they are doing. In general I abhore all this state control over every issue, but you do have to take into account the possibility of abuse if people are left to keep and slaughter animals any which way "they" choose to do it.

Alex, West , uk

How can you trivialize the killing of a sentient being?

You say, "Everyone should do it [kill pigs who ], I cheerfully wrote."

What is 'cheerful' about killing an animal at least as intelligent as a dog and who has probably grown trust you.

Your argument about British slaughter laws would be interesting were killing an innocent thinking-feeling animal not itself so morally wrong under any circumstances.

The "freedom" to kill an animal that has very likely come to see you as a parent or friend is no freedom at all.

Christopher Barden, Beijing, China

'some argue that pigs have a sense of what is going to happen to them'... hello? Wake up. Pigs are more intelligent than dogs. They KNOW what is going to happen to them. Whether you kill them at home or at the abbatoir, bear in mind you're killing something more intelligent than Rover.

Lora Stillwell, London, UK

All to do with financial gain again. Lets please the masses who say they cant afford free range products, but probably spend a fortune on cigarettes and alcohol and deprive themselves and their family to a decent health regime. I am not vegetarian but firmly believe we can change the way we exploit our animals for our consumption. I agree with W Beaumont at Wareham. Wish there were more places and people like that. Many years age I worked opposite an abattoir it is not humane. I heard those animals squeal!
V.Leicester.

VK Smithson, Leicester, England

Some years ago we had our pigs slaughtered on our property, and it certainly was not illegal then. I have been unable to find any evidence of a change in the law in this respect.

Is Tom Hodgkinson sure that the "someone carrying a clipboard " wasn't pulling his leg?

Alec McKenzie, Bishop's Stortford, UK

Mobile slaughter units are the answer but it is an expensive one. A properly fitted out truck would allow the whole process to be controlled, humane and clean, just as it should be. The licensed slaughterman could do his skilled and important job properly and the animal would be saved the stress of travelling and ultimately, the abattoir.

I home rear pigs for our restaurant and have come to know our local abattoir well. Whilst I would rather my pigs were killed here in the field it must be done by a skilled slaughterman, it is not in the pigs or the consumers best interest to be done by anyone with a gun and a knife.

The kindest way is to stun the animal with high voltage electricity then hang them up high to bleed quickly and freely from the throat. Like high voltage electricity, a captive bolt (another slaughter method) is an instrument not available to the general public, and rightly so.

Leave it to the professionals, just take them to the pig and not the other way around.

Verity Webster, Forfar, Angus, Scotland

Really agree with your thoughts about home-reared and killed pork. I have reared several pigs and decided that the stress of sending them to abbatoir was not humane so I killed and butchered them myself . The meat was superb and I am still alive to tell the tale. It is not rocket science to do a check for disease so how about a short course on home killing?

W Beaumont, Wareham, UK

I have my own pigs which I am rearing for own consumption, this is indeed a ludicrous law.
I am very keen to sign a petition, but website directed to does not work, where can I access it?

Vikki Bridgewood, Jedburgh,

Although I am vegetarian I agree that your pigs have the right to die happy and stress free.
Gillian Denty Bristol

gillian denty, bristol, avon

i agree that the slaughter of pigs in abattoirs can cause a degree of stress, however i truely believe that the main reason for your fantastic pork is the feed and lifestyle of your pigs have as they mature.

i would also like to add that you do not need a degree in veterinary science to spot diseased meat!!!!!
therefore i agree that it is obsured to make the slaughter of your own produce illegal.

Fraser

Mr Fraser Elgin, chelmsford, essex

Same here in Italy.

IN THEORY you must take Pinky 'n' Perky to the abbatoir.

In THEORY you MIGHT (as happens here) be able to get a vet to certify the meat at home - after all, what is required is the certificate - the abbatoir is neither here nor there, he only needs a microscope. (S)he'll do check the diaphragm of the slaughtered pig for tapeworm cysts (Cysticercosis).

Why not lobby for a change in the law that would officialise this practice or set up a pig-marking / checking programme where P'n'P can be slaughtered at home, their tagged ears + diaphragm couriered to the appropriate lab and the certificatin issued via fax?

Paolo, San Daniele, Italy

Completely support your campaign. Surely the way to go is to licence the slaughterman rather than the abbatoir? (And no doubt also endure the imposition of a thousand and one regulations on home slaughtering.)

Incidentally, www.thislittlepiggystayedathome.com doesn't seem to be working.

Mary Kennedy, Saxmundham,

You ask at the end of your excellent article on pig keeping: "What is happening to this country?" All the laws of this land are now made by beaurocrats in glass office blocks in Brussels - The EU in short! That is why we lost all our local abattoirs; why we are losing all our local and rural Post Offices and all our traditional ways of life. If you type into Google any of these subjects with EU in the question you will see what a mess those corrupt and unelected people are making of running Britain.
You did ask!
Regards
Vanessa Crichton

Vanessa Crichton, London,