Is This the World’s Worst Commute?

Calves in Ireland will be sent on a long and gruelling journey to Turkey – then killed – as a result of a shameful new live-export deal.

Imagine being forced onto a truck so crowded that you barely have room to stand and then being driven across Europe for days in sweltering heat without food or water. You have no idea where you’re going. There’s no toilet, so filthy waste starts to collect around your feet and the air is thick with the smell of excrement. Conditions are so bad that some of your fellow passengers collapse from exhaustion or dehydration – but nobody comes to help them. Others are so hungry that they try to eat their own dirty bedding. The truck stops at a border – but instead of letting you off, you remain trapped inside for 17 hours while it waits to be allowed across.

You don’t know this, but once you reach your destination, you’re going to be killed.

This is the kind of ordeal that thousands of calves could face when they’re transported from Ireland to Turkey, after a shameful new live-export deal between the two countries was announced this week.

A recent report by European animal-protection groups exposed the horrendous suffering of animals exported from Europe to Turkey. Animals were kept for hours on crowded trucks without any shade or shelter in temperatures up to 41.5 degrees and made to wait at borders for days on end without being offloaded. Some animals died along the way. According to the investigators, 70 per cent of the transporters they inspected were breaking EU regulations.

Other investigations have revealed sickeningly cruel slaughter methods used to kill animals who are shipped to the Middle East, often in unregulated abattoirs and with a barbarity that would be illegal on Irish soil.

Live export is deeply cruel. Please speak out for cows – send a quick message to Ireland’s Agriculture Minister now to oppose this disgraceful trade deal.