The ASDA supermarket chain is being criticised over its recent decision to sell Halal torture meat – that is meat from animals that have not been stunned before having their throats cut.

Animal rights activists have expressed outrage over a decision to put this meat on sale in a British supermarket.

Asda appears to be aware that its decision would cause controversy but said it was being trialled in one store in response to customer demand – presumably as a pilot to determine how much money can be made from this form of animal cruelty!

According to an article in The Grocer magazine, an ASDA spokesman said the meat would only be sold through a third-party concession at the Small Heath store in Birmingham and would not carry the Asda own label. The spokesman reportedly claimed: “It is not being run by us, it’s being run by the National Halal Food Group which sells the Mr Halal brand . . . It’s just a trial in a single store. The reason it’s there is because of customer demands in that area. Similar demands have not been made elsewhere.”

Presumably a third-party vendor selling this “product” on ASDA premises makes it acceptable!

Muhammed Yaqoob, the chief executive of the National Halal Food Group, defended the traditional Muslim method of not pre-stunning the animal, claiming the animal suffered less than animals that had been stunned!

He is reported in The Grocer as claiming “There is a lot of ignorance and misconception surrounding the traditional method of slaughter . . . prior to its death, the animal is treated well, fed and watered in a calm atmosphere before it dies. But with the stun method the animal is often killed alongside other animals like a factory line process.”

British scientific researchers have confirmed that Halal causes great pain in animals as they are left to slowly bleed to death and calls have been made upon the Labour government to ban the process – something the Government has refused to do for fear of losing votes and financial support.

However the Vegetarians International Voice for Animals (VIVA) has condemned the decision by Asda. Its associate director told The Grocer, “We carried out research a few years ago that indicated that most Muslims were happy to eat stunned Halal meat . . . the stun method was introduced in the UK decades ago because of the barbarity of cutting an animal’s throat.”

Meanwhile a spokesperson for the RSPCA said that it was disappointed by Asda’s move and there were many Muslim countries that accepted pre-stunned Halal meat.

Once again we see Labour compromising British norms and standards for the sake of ethnic-minority community votes and money.

It remains to see whether the rest of the so-called “animal welfare” lobby will now get off the fence and support VIVA in its campaign against the imported barbaric practice of Halal slaughter. In the meantime readers are urged to support VIVA by emailing ASDA to protest over their decision to sell Halal meat on their premises