Men see themselves in the dock – and even if the person’s a serial sex attacker they will think of

Men see themselves in the dock – and even if the person’s a serial sex attacker they will think of him as a regular geezer.”. Supermarket chains yesterday reported record meat sales, leaving barely enough supplies to last into the middle of this week, writes Robert Mendick. Supermarket chains yesterday reported record meat sales, leaving barely enough supplies to last into the middle of this week, writes Robert Mendick.
Prices are now expected to rise – by as much as 15 per cent – to cover the increased cost of importing meat from abroad.A survey of leading stores has revealed a rush to buy British meat, though buying had still not reached the panic levels witnessed during last autumn’s fuel crisis.A spokesman for Tesco, the largest supermarket chain, said: “If there is no more British slaughtering, at some point supplies will run out. But that won’t be before the middle of next week, and by then we hope the new slaughtering licences will be operating to put new British stock into the system.” The chain had its “busiest meat week ever”, with 45 per cent more beef sold, 65 per cent more lamb, 35 per cent more chicken and 35 per cent more fish.A Sainsbury’s spokesman said: “We still have UK stock on our shelves so prices have stayed the same.”But we will have to import and pricing is an issue we are looking into at the moment.”The chain will have run out of British lamb by the end of the weekend, and British pork would also be out by the beginning of next week, although British beef was still in good supply, the spokesman added.Asda, which announced shortages of pork and lamb on Friday, said it had already imported cuts of beef from Ireland and was now planning to import consignments of lamb by next week and pork from Holland over the weekend.A spokeswoman said: “We have made a conscious decision that a price rise on staple products like beef, pork and lamb is the last thing anyone could do with right now.”She described the supply of British meat as “patchy”, adding: “People are stocking up buying two or three bits of meat when they would normally have one, but we anticipate there will still be British meat available into next week.”A spokeswoman for Somerfield said: “By the end of tomorrow [Sunday] some areas will not be able to get all types of British meat, but it will be random throughout our stores. We will not be totally running out of British meat but our usual amount won’t be available.”Safeway said it was making plans to import and that supplies of pork and lamb would last until the end of this week..

With an average of 70 per cent of British meat sold via supermarkets, the distribution of animals and meat has had a significant effect on the spread of foot and mouth disease. The clearest indicator is to compare maps showing the spread of foot and mouth in 1967 and now, when the distribution of the disease is much wider. Supermarkets were far smaller businesses in 1967; now they are an industry of giants, with five of them holding the buying power that has drastically changed the way our food is distributed. With an average of 70 per cent of British meat sold via supermarkets, the distribution of animals and meat has had a significant effect on the spread of foot and mouth disease. The clearest indicator is to compare maps showing the spread of foot and mouth in 1967 and now, when the distribution of the disease is much wider. Supermarkets were far smaller businesses in 1967; now they are an industry of giants, with five of them holding the buying power that has drastically changed the way our food is distributed.
Their promise to deliver meat at a very low price is extremely demanding on the supply line. Long-haul distribution is taken for granted, and no distance is seen as too far to transport an animal But it’s cheap.

It is said that you can deliver a meal for four from farm to plate for 10p. We now have the anomaly where an animal can travel 200 miles to slaughter, the carcass a further 100 miles for cutting, then to a holding place and finally back to a store near the field where the animal was reared.Supermarkets either use meat suppliers whose agents travel the country, buying animals at auction or from farms – or they buy direct from the farmers. Supermarkets insist that their meat suppliers slaughter animals at the “dedicated” abattoir of their choice. Tesco, for example, financed much of the building of, and depend upon, St Merryn Meat, a large abattoir in Cornwall.One Sussex farmer was approached by Tesco to sell his beef. He was willing to do so until they insisted that the livestock travel to St Merryn for slaughter.

He had always used a local abattoir 10 miles from his farm, with a very high standard of hygiene and animal welfare. There, the animals are rested after their short journey in the afternoon and killed at dawn the next day before properly awake. “I shuddered at the thought of my animals travelling all the way to Cornwall in a dirty lorry,” he said. He still will not sell to supermarkets.The supermarkets insist that using dedicated abattoirs guarantees food safety – but all abattoirs are inspected to the same standards for hygiene, and rogue outfits are rare. The use of dedicated abattoirs has more to do with chasing higher profits. The organic sector, in particular, finds it difficult to meet the demands of meat buyers. Consequently much organic supermarket meat is sourced abroad.

Supermarket buyers say they cannot find enough British organic meat, but in fact the farmers are not interested in supplying them, and particularly dislike their system of carting animals long distances to “dedicated” abattoirs. This uniformity is the enemy of organic and small-scale animal husbandry.It is telling that the abattoir in Essex where the virus was first identified slaughters 60 per cent of the sows in the UK. The idea that supermarkets could buy animals locally, process them locally and sell them in the nearest branch is derided as impractical. But Somerfield, the smallest of the big five, has successfully started such a scheme and has seen a dramatic rise in sales of locally produced meat, to 15 per cent of the total.