Farmers protested outside the Tory Party Conference amid the current labour crisis.
Pig producers have staged a protest outside the Conservative Party Conference after Boris Johnson played down the prospect of a mass cull of pigs due to a shortage of plant staff.
A group of farmers gathered outside the Manchester conference on Monday morning (4th October) to raise awareness of the industry’s ongoing struggles with finding an available workforce and the possibility of having to cull thousands of healthy pigs.
Producers are now seeing a backlog of well over 120,000 pigs on farms, with many quickly running out of space and many more at or close to the limit.
The labour crisis due to COVID-19 and Brexit at processing plants has resulted in a slowing down of the throughput of British pigs through plants, which is adding to the already severe backlog of pigs on farms.
The prime minister has blamed the pig industry for the staff shortages in abattoirs for not paying enough or creating attractive working conditions.