Hillside Animal Sanctuary

Hillside Animal Sanctuary, based in Frettenham, Norwich, is the United Kingdom's largest home for animals removed from their owners by the direct action of animal rights activists. The vegan-run sanctuary [cite web |title="Vegan run animal shelters" |publisher=Vegan Village |url=http://www.veganvillage.co.uk/charities.htm |accessdate=2007-09-25] is staffed by volunteers and funded entirely on public donations. [cite web |title="Funded on donations" |publisher=Hillside Animal Sanctuary |url=http://www.hillside.org.uk/help.htm |accessdate=2007-09-25] The sanctuary was established by Wendy Valentine and its patron is actor Martin Shaw.

Formation

Valentine formed the sanctuary in 1995 [

Today

Hillside is now home to over 900 rescued animals including horses, donkeys, cows, bulls, goats, sheep, ducks and chickens. [cite web |title="Over 900 rescued animals at Hillside" |publisher=Hillside Animal Sanctuary |url=http://www.hillside.org.uk/about.htm |accessdate=2007-09-25] and claims to be "one of the UK's most successful campaigning organisations for the animals' cause." [cite web |title="Hillside, one of UK's successful campaigning orgs. for animal rights" |publisher=Hillside Animal Sanctuary |url=http://www.hillside.org.uk/about.htm |accessdate=2007-09-25]

Undercover investigations

Hillside has an animal cruelty investigation unit that acts directly on tip-offs from members of the public. The unit provides video evidence that often leads to prosecution in cases of animal cruelty. They have carried out many undercover operations to highlight cases of alleged animal abuse within the British farming industry.

Some of the more well known cases include in 2006, involvement in the successful prosecution of two employees of Bernard Matthews Beck Farm in Felthorpe, near Norwich, who both admitted ill treatment of animals after they were secretly filmed by a member of the Hillside unit beating turkeys with metal poles held like baseball bats. [cite web |title="Poultry workers guilty of playing baseball with turkeys" |publisher=Daily Telegraph Newspaper online |url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/09/07/uturkey.xml |accessdate=2007-09-25] The case was brought to court by the RSPCA and the two men were found guilty. The court's sentence was 200 hours community service. [cite web |title="Poultry workers guilty of playing baseball with turkeys" |publisher=Daily Telegraph Newspaper online |url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/09/07/uturkey.xml |accessdate=2007-09-25] [cite web |title="Inquiry call after turkey cruelty" |publisher=The BBC online |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/norfolk/5324320.stm |accessdate=2007-09-25] Later the same year another investigation by Hillside, at Cherrydene Farm in Bergh Apton, Norfolk (which produces for MFD Foods Ltd.) uncovered animal cruelty. The farm was a member of the animal welfare charity RSPCA-owned 'Freedom Food label'. The 'Freedom Food' stamp of approval informs consumers that any meat carrying its logo is from a farm where animals are kept in the best possible conditions. The footage showed animals kept in squalid conditions and ducks being punched, picked up by the neck and kicked. [cite web |title="Undercover film shows a farmer punching a duck" |publisher=(This is London) The Evening Standard online |url=http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23388697-details/Undercover%20film%20shows%20a%20farmer%20punching%20a%20duck/article.do?expand=true |accessdate=2007-09-25] The farm has since been sold and closed down. [cite web |title="Film shows neglect of pigs, turkeys and ducks sold under ethical label" |publisher=Guardian Newspaper online |url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/animalrights/story/0,,2032547,00.html |accessdate=2007-09-25]

Television

Hillside the animal sanctuary and also Hillside's separate work in uncovering animal cruelty have both featured in television programmes, including Channel 4's "It's Me or the Dog", BBC Three's "The Baby Borrowers" and the BBC Two programme "Escape to the Country" which has an episode dedicated to Hillside. [cite web |title="Hillside HTML document" |publisher=Hillside Animal Sanctuary |url=http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:mwAUjIS1zrEJ:www.hillside.org.uk/documents/Winter_Newsletter_2006.pdf+Escape+to+the+Country+Hillside+episode+Norwich+Animal+Santuary&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=uk |accessdate=2007-09-25] ITV's "Tonight with Trevor McDonald" featuring Hillside's Investigation footage and the RSPCA defending their Freedom Food Scheme. Also the same programme broadcast on 11 June 2007 showing what goes on behind the scenes in the organic poultry industry. Channel 4's "Dispatches" programmes 'Supermarket Secrets'. The BBC's "Inside Out" which was based on Hillside's investigative footage 'Pigs in Purgatory', also on another episode of Channel 4's "Dispatches" 'What's Really in Your Christmas Dinner?' which won PETA UK's Best Animal-Friendly Television Programme for 2006 saying: "Especially eye-opening was video footage from inside the factory farms where turkeys and pigs are intensively reared. In "Supermarket Secrets", Journalist Jane Moore looked at the cost consumers and animals are paying for cheap, homogenised, convenient supermarket food. Undercover video footage taken inside a chicken broiler house and an examination of the miserable lives of dairy cows reinforced how bad the conditions are for animals used for meat and milk. [ [http://www.peta.org.uk/feat/proggy/2006/winners.html PETA, accessed 12/11/07] ] With information about factory farming and a Sky News report about duck farming featuring undercover Hillside footage. [ [http://www.hillside.org.uk/acatalog/videos.html Hillside] accessed 12/11/07]

Wendy Valentine

Valentine is a vegan and the founder of Hillside Animal Sanctuary (1995) [cite web |title="Hillside Animal Sanctuary started by Wendy Valentine" |publisher=Hillside Animal Sanctuary |url=http://www.hillside.org.uk/about.htm |accessdate=2007-09-25] and the Redwings Horse Sanctuary in Norfolk (1984). In 2005 she was cautioned by police over a protest she staged in the city centre of Hanford. She scattered six dead turkeys just days before Christmas to highlight the conditions they were kept in. [cite web |title="Licence for thuggery" |publisher=Norwich Evening News 24 |url=http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/content/news/story.aspx?brand=ENOnline&category=News&tBrand=ENOnline&tCategory=news&itemid=NOED06%20Jan%202007%2010%3A01%3A47%3A103 |accessdate=2007-09-25] Valentine is an out-spoken animal rights advocate: “We have looked at 10 [RSPCA-affiliated] farms and the conditions were so bad in two of them that the RSPCA had to initiate a prosecution of two farms they were supposed to be monitoring! Needless to say, the RSPCA doesn’t want a farm they were monitoring to be found guilty” she explains. Valentine added that while Britain has some of the best animal protection laws in the world, they are rarely enforced or upheld. “The farms are protected,” she said, “not the animals.” [ [http://www.farmedanimal.net/faw/faw6-33.htm A View from the Hillside] farmedanimal.net, accessed 12/11/07] In 2001 Valentine, along with a colleague were fined for trespassing on to a pig farm in north Norfolk to gather evidence of cruelty and the poor living conditions. They were fined nearly £5,000 after they pleaded guilty to entering an infected place, namely Woodlands Farm, without written permit during a swine fever outbreak. District Judge Patrick Heley described the way in which Valentine and her accomplice gathered their evidence as "improper, illegal, intrusive and irresponsible", he also dismissed their video evidence. [ [http://www.warmwell.com/pigsjan20.html Pig cruelty evidence was illegal - judge] warmwell.com, accessed 12/11/07]

References

External links

* [http://www.hillside.org.uk Official website]
* [http://www.edp24.co.uk/Content/Sport/Equestrian/2005/asp/Sanctuary.asp From Suffering to Sanctuary: The 10th Anniversary of Hillside’s Work by Wendy Valentine]
* [http://www.hillside.org.uk/investigations/investigations-slaughter.htm Information on Hillside investigations]
* [http://www.hillside.org.uk/LarrietwithmumIrene.htm Lamb born in abattoir is moved to Hillside with mum (Daily Express Newspaper clippings)]
* [http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=3737310359930116161 google video: (Hillside) A look into the factory farmed duck industry]
* [http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/news/content_objectid=13353237_method=full_siteid=106694_headline=-DISTRESSED-AND-DYING-IN-A-CRAMPED-SHED--NOBODY-DOES-CHICKEN-LIKE-name_page.html Sunday Mirror & Hillside investigation article]