Farmer's fear over protesters' attacks
Officers from five police forces converged on a Lincolnshire farm where hundreds of animal rights protesters staged a demonstration.
Placards emblazoned with 'vivisection is vile' and 'does money justify murder' were brandished by many of the 400 campaigners descending on Normanby by Spital near Market Rasen.
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Animal rights protestors gathered outside Highgate Farm at Normanby by Spital.
The message was directed at Geoff Douglas, the owner of Highgate Farm, which supplies rabbits to controversial Huntingdon Life Sciences's labs in Cambridgeshire.
Animal rights campaigners say this is where they 'suffer and die in cruel, useless experiments'.
And on Saturday campaigners from across the UK joined the demonstration organised by the high -profile Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty.
While activists from the group have previously been convicted of affray and inciting violence and terror, there were no arrests made.
However, a 33-year-old protester from the West Midlands, who asked remain anonymous, said this would be the first of many demonstrations at the farm.
"You're not going to get all these people today and then they're going to go away and forget about it," she said.
More than 100 officers were deployed to the demonstration from Nottinghamshire, Humberside, Leicestershire, Derbyshire and Lincolnshire forces.
Spokesman for Lincolnshire Police, Dick Holmes said: "We have invested a great deal of time and effort in planning an appropriate balanced response and policing the event in an impartial way."
For more on the protest, see Monday's Echo.
7 Comments
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by Me, Lincoln
Wednesday, September 30 2009, 2:03PM
“Animal testing should be banned as there is very little proof that it benefits humans. And come on... for what reason should this kind of work be done with no anaesthetic other then pure corporate greed?!?!?!?!
I would suggest that we begin to use convicted paedophiles and serial murders etc, who as far as I'm concerned, gave up their human rights when they destroyed other people's/family's lives!!!!!”
by Hussydog, In Your Head
Tuesday, September 29 2009, 8:26AM
“If I was to open the floodgates here and say if animals are to be treated as equal and fairly as humans, why do we Euthinaise our pets at the end of life rather than let them suffer as we do with humans with terminal illness?
I'm not against testing on animals when it comes to medical research using drugs, this I believe benefits all humans as they have a starting point to finesse for human consumption, but to mindlessly operate on animals without anaesthetic is just cruelty.”
by Havelock Vetinari, Ankh-Morpork
Tuesday, September 29 2009, 6:42AM
“So the petty insults from the people who do not actually understand vivisection come out. You people do realise that its a surgery on an animal that is still alive and not under anaesthetic. So I ask you people would you like someone to come along to your home, pick up your pet dog or rabbit and just start carving away at its head right infront of you without giving it any pain relief in an experiment to see if the animal feels pain....
As for them testing drugs on animals, it has been found to show no evidence of making the drugs actually work if they are tested on animals. You only have to look as far as hair dye that is tested on Rabbits and then when used by a human causes skin problems as a case in point.
Animal Testing in general is all about money, why are they still testing fags on beagles, when we can all clearly see what fags do to the human lungs..
RE. Missouri Marten, murder as a word is the unlawful killing of any sentient being. In "law" it is defined as the murder of another human being. Therefore if you kill an animal you are a murderer.”
by Will, The Shire
Monday, September 28 2009, 1:54PM
“If these protesters do truly believe in animal rights, maybe they should volunteer themselves for the experiments instead? Not only would we get the experiments we need, but we would also clean up the gene pool.”
by NJT, Nettleham
Monday, September 28 2009, 12:47PM
“Spokesman for Lincolnshire Police, Dick Holmes said: "We have invested a great deal of time and effort in planning an appropriate balanced response and policing the event in an impartial way."
So, placing 4 Police Officers at the entrance to Lincolnshire Police HQ is an approached balanced response. Obviously the same method has been used to calculate the number of personnel needed in the Force Human Resources department!!”